Transformers: Origins
by Kurieo Parnok
Summary: Ever wondered what the Transformers did before the Great War and how they entered it? Who went good and who went bad? Who was just crazy in the first place? Here's my take on it.
1. Megatron

**Summary: Ever wondered what the Transformers were doing before the Great War? Well, here's my take on their origins. Rated for violence.**

**AN: I realized that I haven't posted anything in a while (Too busy working on other fics), so I set this up. If I make any lore mistakes, feel free to correct me. ^_ I'm just sticking with Earth time units because it's less confusing that way. These chapters can be read individually, but if they are connected, it will be notified and the chapters run in a general direction with the first being at the beginning of the war and progressing on from there. If you want to see a specific character's origins revealed, feel free to PM it to me.**

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and all connected blessings. I am only borrowing Transformers for non-profit entertainment purposes.**

**Chapter 1: Megatron**

The silver mech looked around with pale blue optics, taking in the sight of the towering hall of the Autobot Academy. Lining the entrance hall he stood in were statues of the Transformers' greatest heroes from the Revolutionary War and those who had delivered them into the Golden Age. Around him, other mechs awed at the impressively decorated entrance hall. All the youth here, some being just past Sparklings, were here to enroll in the Academy and become warriors of the Cybertron Space Guard with the goal of protecting their home planet, Cybertron, from any and all foes.

"Wow," the silver mech whispered.

"Eh, it's okay, but I'm looking for something along the lines of femmes and energon."

The silver mech turned to see a younger robot standing near by. Colored red and white, the metal wings on the robot's back suggested he could transform into a jet. Beside him stood a much larger robot, colored white with only red and blue highlights.

"Are you in the Warriors Branch, too?" the silver mech asked.

"Nah; Pops insisted that I go to the _Science Branch_," the red and white robot that had spoken replied, rolling his turquoise optics. "Honestly, science? Did the old man _not_ see the wings? I'm meant for battle!"

"We can all fight in our own ways," the silver mech suggested.

"Yeah, right," the younger robot snorted. "And I suppose organics can think, too? Come on, Skyfire, let's get this year started that way we can _end it_ as soon as possible."

The silver mech watched the two jet-transformers go away, wondering why the young jet-former was so upset about being in the Academy.

"Hey, you!"

He jerked as some one shouted at him and looked around. Sure enough, a space at the check in counter was open. The counter was in the very front of the entrance hall, beneath the enormous moving hologram pictures of Alpha Trion, Superior Magnus of the Transformers. Feeling silly at his gawking, he moved forward as the clerk robot lifted their fingers over their computer keyboard.

"Name?" the clerk asked.

"Megatron," he replied. "I'm here to enroll in the Autobot Academy under the Warrior Branch."

* * *

**One Year Later**

It was after curfew at the Autobot Academy, but a small party of youthful Autobot Academy students was collected in an alley behind the kitchen, passing around a bottle of hardcore energon and cracking jokes against each other questioning the amount of decency they had to organics in very crude ways. Megatron was there, looking slightly nervous about being caught, but ready to join the dirty jokes and energon drinking to keep face with his fellow mechs. Starscream was there and leading the dirty jokes, having brought the shared bottle of energon and his reluctant friend, Skyfire, along as well. The dirty organic jokes led to a discussion of how intelligent organics were (not very was the large argument), but one mech, a gentle giant by the name of Skyfire, said something that instantly turned the conversation to that of naughty humor to serious philosophy.

"I heard that there are some organic planets near Cybertron space territory whose inhabitants are showing signs of intelligence and even self-governing. The Council of Cybertron is beginning to debate what to do with them."

"How would you know what the Council is thinking?" one of the other youthful mechs asked.

"My father is apart of the Council," Skyfire replied. "He's one of the main organic biologist consultants."

"And we care about what the old guys are thinking about organics because…?" the leader of the group asked.

"Well, I just thought that it was worth bringing up," Skyfire said. "I mean, what do you think? Should we enslave the organics, befriend them, or destroy them and take their resources and energon deposits for ourselves?"

"The last," Megatron grunted after he swigged from the energon bottle and passed it on. His optics were gaining a purple tinge around the edges. "They're just organics; stupid blood bags that aren't even worth our attention beyond cleaning them off of the universe. The universe is for the strong and smart, and the organics are far from either of those."

"Hear here!" Starscream agreed.

"But we could help them become more than organics!" Skyfire pointed out. "We could teach them things, upgrade them, build them into so much more than just blood sacks—"

"If you can manage such a feat of strength," Megatron laughed, crossing his arms across his chest, "Then I'll eat my arm cannon! Organics are so far below us that _any_ display of intelligence is something to be disbelieved. The universe belongs to us, the Transformers! All other creatures are merely pests that deserve to be exterminated!"

Some mechs cheered. Others grimaced nervously. A few were drunk enough to think that Megatron was cracking a joke that their groggy processors could not grasp and laughed. It was tiniest glimpse of what was to come.

* * *

**Three Years Later**

"What do you mean that I'm expelled!?" Megatron bellowed, red-purple optics flashing in anger.

"I am sorry, Megatron," the Autobot Academy Headmaster apologized, "You're a fine student, a _spectacular _one, and you would have made a superb Prime someday, if not the ruler of Cybertron, but your rants against the Council have become too, shall we say, _zealous_ for comfort. We warned you time and time again, Megatron, but you refused to listen and now I'm afraid that we can not allow you to complete your schooling here for fear hat should you make it into the Autobot Army, you will come to be close enough to assassinate Cybertron Council members—"

"This is engine slag!" Megatron exclaimed. "Doesn't a mech have a right to his opinions anymore?"

"You are _gathering rebels_ around you!" the Headmaster wailed, "There is even talk in some of the high circles that you are planning a _revolt_ against the Council!"

"That's ridiculous; those 'rebels' are just my friends who happen to agree with me!"

"I am sorry, Megatron," the Headmaster said again sadly, "But you can not be allowed to stay here."

Half an hour later Megatron was speeding out of the city in his two-wheeled motorcycle-like form. His engine was hissing nastily in anger as he sped around slower, less fortunate motorists. Kicked out, abandoned, _expelled_ for his opinions, opinions that were the truth! The Council really _was_ a board of old, over-pampered, pompous wind-bags who did nothing! For _years_ now they had reigned and nothing new was happening; no expansion, no strengthening, no fixing of old parts or the creation of new parts in the space territories of the Transformers' reigning land. They just _sat_ there _uselessly_ twiddling their thumbs and talking, moving matters of importance to the side so that they could conversate about the weather. Speaking of which…

Lightening cracked in the dark clouds overhead and Megatron sped up, spotting a rest stop ahead. Approaching the tiny building, he realized that it was closed up and abandoned; the shell of something forgotten in the enormous desert outside of the city. He drove under the over hanging roof attached to the building and transformed into his robot form just as the acidic rain came down from over head. He saw a less lucky motorist driving up the road short out as the acid rain snuck under their hood and threw their electronic systems out of line. Megatron laughed at the motorist as they slowed and stopped. The motorist began honking their horn to call for help, but he ignored them, not wishing to get into the rain himself. Sighing, he leaned against the wall of the boarded up building and stared up at the underside of the rusting metal roof he had taken shelter under. He closed his optics, listening to the rain as he went deep into his own thoughts.

Another thing that had Megatron annoyed: Why was it that the military mechs almost always agreed with him, but the factory mechs disagreed? He knew his history well enough: Transformers were once the robot servants of the Quinstons before the robots became sentient and began to fight for their freedom. In the long war between the servant-bots and Quinstons, the robots had gone underground and developed the ability to transform into various machines. Calling themselves Transformers, they over threw the Quinstons and thus began the Transformer reign of Cybertron and its surrounding planets: The Transformers that had, at one time, been military defenders of the Quinstons before their sentience were noticeably larger, more hostile, and better armed than the calmer more docile factory mechs. Megatron had come to tell the difference between the two parties during his rants against the Council: Military mechs cheered while the factory worker decedents scolded him for being so violent.

But what was the point of this? His life was ruined; no one would hire an Autobot Academy expellee, and for what? Just because he was saying what he thought against a bunch of old guys on the Council—

_ "You're a fine student, a spectacular one, and you would have made a superb Prime someday, if not the ruler of Cybertron…"_

Yeap, that was what the Headmaster said: He could have been the _Supreme_ of _Cybertron_ and led the very board of old fools he had criticized had he not been so zealous—

Wait a sec…

Megatron's optics opened up, flaring a bright grey in realization.

"_I'm afraid that we can not allow you to complete your schooling here for fear hat should you make it into the Autobot Army, you will come to be close enough to assassinate Cybertron Council members…"_

"_You are __gathering rebels__ around you! There is even talk in some of the high circles that you are planning a revolt against the Council!"_

Without warning, Megatron burst out into loud laughter, his optics glowing as they warped away from their pale-blue color to purple, then darkening purple before adopting a hue like a setting sun on a desert planet: Red.

It was so funny! It was just so slagging ironic and sad that it was hilarious! The Headmaster and his fellows had expelled Megatron thinking that he would do something that he had never seriously thought of before, only to suggest it to him themselves! Oh, he would just _love_ to explain this to them later, next time he met them… in their bed chambers… splattered in the energon of their guards…

The rain had stopped by now and the stalled motorist on the road finally transformed, jumping a little with recoiling shocks zapping them. Megatron stopped laughing, suddenly remembering the other person.

"Hey!" the other Transformer snarled, approaching Megatron, "Couldn't you help a guy out here?? I was _yelling _for _help_ for the past ten minutes!"

Megatron debated about what to do for a moment, his arms and ankles crossed casually as his red optics blazed in the shadows beneath the dripping metal roof. Well, since he was just going to be killing _a lot _of people in the coming days…

He didn't even bother smirking as he raised his arm; the one donned with his favorite black arm cannon, and shot the motorist in the face. The now-faceless mech's body collapsed to the ground as his color faded into grey on him. Megatron stared at the body, wondering distantly why he was not more appaled about killing another mech. Then again, he was a direct descendant of the military drones that had once done the brunt of the fighting for freedom among the original Transformers; killing was in his nature.

Five minutes later, he was on the road again, speeding away from the body as he planned. Later, when he passed a rest-and-bus stop and spotted an off-duty soldier's gun resting on the table, he scanned the mode into his own systems. He reverted back to his robot mode even as the gun's blue print was embedded into his transformation program and he walked straight on to the bus stop, already debating where he would go.

* * *

**Two Years Later**

More mechs than what had initially been hoped for had gathered in the run-down gladiator arena on the nameless asteroid. One could wish to say that they came from all walks of life, but this was not the case: They came from the rough paths that good creatures are often forced onto, warping them into vile monstrosities. Murderers, cut throats, criminals, Stockade escapees, army deserters, thieves, psychopaths, mercenaries, bounty hunters, and all-around bad people that mothers warn their little ones away from; they were all there, but why? Why would so many selfish Sparks bear to wait for an hour together in this abandoned facility of violence without battling each other?

The uneasy muttering of the crowd fell silent when a mech entered the center of the arena. He had black square boots, hands, and right arm cannon, with a simple helmet and a scowling face donned with fearsome red optics. He was young, everyone could see, but what was age to a race that could live for eons easily? The air he carried, the scowl in his face, the laser fire in his optic made him a much older mech than one would like to admit. He walked out of one of the side entrances into the arena and stepped up onto the hood of a Transformer car that had crashed into the sandy arena long ago. He looked around at the mechs, ensuring that all optics were on him before he spoke.

"Gentle-mechs and femmes," he began. "I, Megatron, am pleased to see that my call for _employment_ reached so many willing audio receptors, and I am sure that you are curious as to what it includes beyond a simple 'work for me' requirement."

There were some careless agreeing grumbles; if this mech was wasting their time, they'd probably shoot him, loot his body, and go back to what ever dark apartment they came from.

"See, a few years ago," Megatron went on. "I realized something: The Cybertron Council is a board of stupid, old mechs who couldn't find their skid plates with both servos and a global positioning system. New energon is needed to rule Cybertron to expand it, strengthen it, and make it far more than just a race of stay-at-home femme motherlings and gadgets. In short: _I_ want to replace them. _I_ want to fix the issues they have so long neglected, _I_ want to clip off all those unnecessary _weaklings_ drawing our species down and eradicate any pesky organics that dare breathe in this universe. Of course, what I am talking about is treason of the highest decree: A revolt."

Several mechs begin muttering to each other in surprise and even amusement. A revolt! My, my, who did this mech think he was?

"But, of course, a revolt can not be done by one mech alone, and this is where you're 'employment' comes in," the mech went on. "I desire of you your undying loyalty and services, your weapons, your bodies, to fight as I command. Those of you who serve me loyally and well will be rewarded the day I become the sole Lord of Cybertron. Those of you who would choose to take the treacherous path, well…" The mech shrugged, stroking his arm cannon. "It's rather obvious."

"You're crazy," a large green and black Transformer growled, dropping down into the arena and walking towards Megatron. "Taking over the government? Lord of Cybertron? What kind of _slag_ are you on? You need a little knocking around to get your processor on your shoulders straight—"

But the green-black mech, easily chest, shoulders, and head higher than Megatron, had sorely underestimated Megatron. Just as the mech came with in Megatron's arm reach, Megatron spun around and acted almost too fast for the audience to see. All the aggravator was aware of was that a hand grabbed the back of his head and forced him down and he found the end of Megatron's arm cannon crammed into his mouth, ready to blow his processor into the air with a mere mental command from Megatron.

"Yes," Megatron said with deadly calmness, "I am aware of the idiocy of the whole idea in theory; taking over Cybertron? How ridiculous! But answer me this…"

He removed his gun, only to knee the mech in the face and leave him to roll on the ground, crying out in pain as energon squirted from his nasal unit and Megatron turned back to his audience.

"How many of you have ever wished for something more?" Megatron called out. "How many of you have ever dreamed of glory? Or sought for a _real _challenge or purpose beyond merely mugging little elderly femme units for energon money? How many of you have complained about the restrictiveness of the Cybertron Council's laws, or were jailed for doing merely what you had to do to survive? How many of you have desired to spill energon and break metal casings without consequence? How many of you have wished to just _let it out_ and fight with all your strength and skills? If you are one of any of those mechs, then you belong with me! You belong with in an army that will bring a new dawn of leadership to Cybertron and all its providences, you all belong…"

He suddenly lifted a hand to his chest and ripped a sheet of a sticky metal surface off of his chest.

"With the Decepticons!" Megatron finished with a shout, dropping the disguising gauze to the ground and lifting a fist high over head. Beneath the gauze was a purple insignia tattooed on his chest plating. It was triangular in shape, but what was it of; canine, a bird, or a demon? The history-savvy members of the audience recognized the insignia as the face of an ancient Quinston god of chaos, death, and destruction.

The speech was effective; it had touched a deeper thing with in all the mechs assembled, making their desire for change flare to life and hook onto this mech, this Megatron, for anchorage. The crowds cheered in support of Megatron, already making inner promises to follow this mech from one end of the universe to the other. Hardly anyone noticed their optics switching to red and none cared.

Megatron stood in the center of the arena, smirking triumphantly as the supporting shouts of his new troops echoed around him like demons of the Pit. These shouts soon came to chant Megatron's new title:

"Hail, Lord Megatron!" the crowd shouted. "Hail, Lord Megatron! Hail, Lord Megatron!"

Lord Megatron: No one knew it then, but this Lord Megatron would unleash an unexpected wave of death and destruction across the universe. A wave that would come to drown innocent planets, snuff out blooming civilizations on currently oblivious planets, kill hundreds of people, both mech and organic alike, and destroy thousands of more lives in the process. Mechs would join the Decepticons, and others would foolishly attempt to leave. Some mechs would join the army grudgingly, but come to love it and its leader with all their Sparks. Others would eagerly join the army, only to realize the horrors of war, or the dangers of working under a mech who was more than ready to destroy a traitor, and would attempt to leave, only to have their worst fears come true.

Whether they would stay or go, the new troops' shouts were calling in a new era of conflict and war, an era of legends, and an era of Decepticons and Autobots.


	2. Shockwave

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all attached blessings belong to Hasbro and their proper owners. This fiction is not for commercial purposes, but for purely entertainment purposes.**

**Chapter 2: Shockwave**

"The answer is no, Dr. Shockwave," the head scientist stated. "We will not sacrifice any 'bots life, even convicts' lives, for experimentation."

"But Dr. Peppermetal, sir," the one-optic, tall, purple robot argued to the red and black robot. "This could help us find out what our source of life is—what _all_ source of life is. It could even help us prevent or even stop death—"

"The answer is still _no_, Shockwave," Dr. Peppermetal said firmly. "We will never sacrifice life, even an impure convict life, for _any_ of our experiments. We will just have to find the answer to life somewhere else. This meeting is over, Shockwave."

Shockwave turned on his heels and walked out of the meeting room where he had had the science committee collected. When he was walking through the halls of the Cybertronian Scientology University on his own a moment later, his wing-like ear fins drooped in agitation while his lone golden optic flared in the closest image he could ever get to anger.

His argument had been impenetrable! He had had five example cases where other mechs had experimented on convicts in the past, causing the death of the convicts on more than one occasion. He had listed countless reasons why his experiment should be allowed to go on. He had managed to neutralize any negatives with proper legal codes and laws that would protect them should anything go horribly wrong. He was ready to even fund the project _himself_; he was certainly rich enough from being such a good professor at the university for the past Primus-knew how many years… and they _still_ said no! What was _their _reason? Didn't they want to find a way to overcome death, or at least make them, and their Sparks, stronger? What had gotten in the way of Shockwave's success?

Emotion; _that_ was what had gotten in Shockwave's way. Humph, emotions; what was it about them that made everyone appreciate them so much? Shockwave saw only delay and handicaps in emotion…

"Dr. Shockwave! Dr. Shockwave!"

Shockwave turned around to a university student, one of the boys in Shockwave's upgrades and technology class, running up to him excitedly, his turquoise optics flashing in excitement.

"Come quick, Dr. Shockwave, something's happening on the news!" the student exclaimed, tugging on Shockwave's hand before bolting back the way he had come. The student transformed into a four-wheeled vehicle in mid-step, leaving rubber tracks on the floor as he sped of with reckless youth. Shockwave also transformed into what could aptly be called a Cybertronian muscle car; some what old fashioned, but strong and classy.

Shockwave followed the student curiously to the university's cafeteria. It seemed like the university's entire population had collected in the massive dining hall and had their optics glued to the jumbo-sized TV screens that were attached high up on the wall. But when Shockwave saw what was on, even he stopped in shock, transforming back to robot form.

The news was on, and a reporter was talking, but no one could hear or even cared to understand what the reporter was saying. They didn't need him anyway; they could see what was going on well enough. Robots were attacking the Cybertronian Council Headquarters. The scene on screen was of a busy city street from a building roof outside of the CC HQ. Mechs supporting a peculiar canine-like insignia were battling the military attempting to protect the headquarters, slaughtering them mercilessly. They were larger, stronger, and above all, more _hostile_.

"What is happening?" Shockwave whispered in awe.

"Someone called Megatron's leading a coup against the Council," the student that had escorted Shockwave to the cafeteria replied. "Apparently, he's convinced that the baton of leadership has to move on to someone else. Look! There he is now!"

Sure enough, the camera man had zoomed in on a strong gun-grey mech leading the raid on the military complex. Shockwave's optic flickered as he watched the mech, Megatron, lift his large arm cannon and mercilessly blow a soldier's head away. No regret or mercy flashed across his face. The most emotion he had was probably impatience that things weren't moving ahead at a faster pace.

Such confidence and strength, unhindered by petty things like doubt or worry, and not unfocused by distracting trifles like happiness of pre-paid victory; it was amazing. Suddenly, Shockwave noticed something.

"His weapons are all standard," he muttered.

"Huh?" Shockwave's student asked.

"The weapons the rebels are using," Shockwave went on. "They're all standard; mere pawn shop knock offs and turbo fox hunting rifles that can easily be bought with a handful of currency and a proper ID. They can pierce minor armor, but can't get beyond a strong Transformer's body armor and will do insurance pocket change damage to buildings. If their _rebellion_ is going to last, then they will need proper weapons."

"Yeah, right," someone who had overheard Shockwave laughed. "They'll all be in jail by the end of the day!"

"Hey, I know that guy," a red and white mech in front of Shockwave said. The mech elbowed his larger white companion and pointed to the screen as Megatron appeared again, "Hey, Skyfire, isn't that the guy who got kicked out of the Autobot Academy a few years back?"

"The one who was expelled for suspicion of conspiracy a few months before we decided a major," Skyfire inquired, "Yes, yes it is, fascinating. I suppose the Headmaster wasn't as paranoid as the rumors said. But like the other fellow said: Their fire power is vastly in superior to official Cybertronian military and their chances of victory are approximately less than four point—"

"Ah, put a spark plug in it, Skyfire," Starscream interrupted.

_True, they may be underpowered, but it would be almost __too__ easy to upgrade those weapons, even for those rebels,_ Shockwave thought, watching as the news team decided to high tail it out of the battle before they were shot. He began to calculate how much it would cost in materials to upgrade the mechs alone—

His mind froze as his optic blinked in surprise at what he was thinking. He looked around, as if to see if anyone had sensed his thoughts. No one was watching him, though; all had their heads turned up to watch the TV screen. Turning away, he quietly left the cafeteria, heading for his private laboratory.

* * *

Dr. Peppermetal sat at his desk late that night, pouring over the fund forms that had been mailed to him that day. Usually, he would have had these forms sorted out and filed away hours ago. They were simple enough: these funds came from that company those credits came from that mech on that condition, et cetera et cetera. But the excitement of the sudden military coup had had everyone, including himself, in an unfocused storm of activity. Even now, he could hear the distant parties sprung from the college students' excitement as they celebrated what they probably correctly thought was their last night of free peace. He would not be surprised if some students were actually making plans to fight the Decepticon rebels, or passing bets as to how long this military coup would last.

The leader, Megatron, had been captured and his half-aft troops had retreated, but the coup was continuing. All over the place, like rare sporadic spots of a starting cancer spreading as far as the out skirts of the farthest asteroid fields in Transformer space, more of these—what were they?—Decepticons were appearing. They were capturing or harassing small towns or plunging cities into chaos, creating a sense of unease that wrapped around the Transformer race like an unwanted paint coat.

Things had not gotten better for him when students and even teachers had been dropping off self-dismissal forms as they ran off to join the Autobot army or, sensing danger, were fleeing to less populated areas of space. But what scared him was that not all those dismissed students didn't run away to safer places _or_ join the Autobots. Where they could have gone scared Peppermetal: Were there really youth that decided that joining the Decepticons was worth it? Didn't they know that they were going to destroy their futures if they did that?

Unable to focus on the forms, Dr. Peppermetal set the cyber-pads down and rubbed his face in frustration. He did not hear the door to his office open, nor did he hear the clomping of approaching metal boots. He only looked up in alarm when he heard the click of a loading gun behind him. A small pop sounded out as a silencer muffled the laser shot had been fired and Dr. Peppermetal jerked as the back of his head fully received the metal-melting deadly impact of the laser fire.

Dr. Peppermetal's body slumped over the desk as the light in his optics dimmed and the color of his metal drained out, becoming a heavy, dull, dead grey color. A purplish metal hand reached under Peppermetal's body and pulled out the funding sheets.

Shockwave felt something like horror pass through him briefly before he reflexively brushed the emotion aside. He had done it and there was no going back now. He didn't need nor want something as petty as regret making him doubt himself and cause him to make mistakes.

Going over to Dr. Peppermetal's computer, Shockwave easily accessed the university's fund account. He had handled the account several times in his long history at the university and hence, it was an easy task to enter in the funds from the numerous donators before transferring them to his own bank account. From there, he transferred the stolen funds and personal currency to a private account hidden in a cyber-bank account used by paranoid and suspicious people who did not desire others to see their funds. He didn't need to worry about being caught for having such a huge and obviously illegal fund transfer: he knew that he was going to be caught for Dr. Peppermetal's murder, it was inevitable, unless the Autobots were complete idiots. But hopefully, by the time anyone had found Dr. Peppermetal's body, Shockwave would already be far away heading for more promising fields.

The funds transferred, Shockwave looked down at his left hand. Something like surprise and even loss flickered through his cool Spark before he hastily used logic to banish it once more. He had removed his hand, so what? Six hours in his lab had been more than enough to whip up a superior gun that he would need in the coming days. Removing it had been a bit difficult when he had administered numbing medical shocks to his doomed arm and found himself operating with only his right hand. But he had been able to remove it with a buzz saw reserved for clean cutting sheets of metal for his technology and up grade class projects, and from there, had attached the gun he had designed. True, he could have just _bought_ a gun, but this one was vastly more powerful and superior than anything he could have bought from any black market dealer. The only issue he had had was that it tended to drain his energy quickly. He had easily over come that negative by installing an extra, radioactive element powered fuel cell in his chest, expanding the once-flat chest area slightly to make it look like he had more muscle. Well, now that he looked at it that way, he _did_ have more muscle, didn't he?

Shockwave peeked outside the hall for late night strollers before exiting the crime scene. He took long, quick strides, always scanning around to make sure that no one was out and noticing his departure. He held his new gun arm close, wary of anyone who might see it. Frequently he twitched that arm in an instinctive gesture to clench his fist, but always the gun merely shifted its barrel slightly.

Finally, he came to the road leading from the city into the university's grounds and stopped, feeling quite silly as he realized something.

_I can't transform into my vehicle mode now,_ he realized. _The gun wasn't made to fit it. Blasted, I should have been more careful and tried to fix __that__ nasty bug out…_

So… how was he going to get to where he was going without being caught? Yeah, _that_ would be an interesting thing to say to any out-and-about law enforcers: Excuse me, sir, but is that a gun attached to your arm? No, it's a musical instrument. Want to hear it whistle a tune?

Well, there _was_ one way he could get to his destination, but he hadn't done it ever since he was a teen-bot and had started showing off his muscle car alt-form. It was a semi-common ability in many Transformers that had been decedents of the battle-bots made by the Quinstons, but it often disappeared after years of neglect.

Focusing his energon flow towards his feet, Shockwave felt for the familiar tingly, breezy feeling. Once it came, inner technology took over and he floated off the ground easily as knowledge as how to maneuver via hover abilities flowed back into his mind. It was like transforming; even if you haven't done it in a while, it all just comes back to you when you remember the first steps.

Shockwave flew up and over the city buildings, flying towards the police station.

* * *

Megatron sat in his cell glaring at the floor with ruby optics angrily. The guards out side his cell had finally ceased bullying him for his rash decisions for the up rising that day, but Megatron was still angry: he had been captured, his weapons had been taken, and now it looked like he would be facing a long sentence in an underground energon mine somewhere. Blast it, he should have chosen a proper second-in-command or at least made a back up plan in case such a thing happened. He would have to be more careful in the future…

Suddenly, an explosion rocked the cell, making Megatron jerk to attention with a start. From further up the hall where the police head quarter's jail entrance room was, one of the police mechs went sliding on the concrete floor past the cell, leaving a glowing trail of energon behind him. Something had torn the mech up badly, leaving an enormous crater where his chest had been.

Megatron's guards watched their fallen comrade slide by, their optics widening and their jaws dropping in shock. They exchanged glances before running in the direction of the explosion. Megatron stood as laser fire was quickly exchanged. As quickly as it begun, it ended. After a moment, an unfamiliar purple, one-eyed robot came to Megatron's cell, security card held in one good hand while the other, a gun hand, smoked as it cooled. The energon splattering his metal body made it clear who was the one who had busted into the jail.

"Come along quickly, My Lord," the mech's cultured voice implored as he unlocked Megatron's cell. "The Autobot forces will be arriving shortly to see what the matter is."

"Who are you?" Megatron asked, stepping out of his cell. "And why have you helped me?"

"I, Lord Megatron, sir, am Shockwave, a late professor of the Cybertron Scientology University. When I found out about your goals for this planet, I decided that I wished to aide you."

He bowed to show his servitude.

"Why?" Megatron inquired. He sounded accusing, and his optics flickered across Shockwave's own blank expanse of a face as he sought for any double crossing or hidden agenda in the scientist.

"Because you are a leader who appears to be unmarred by pathetic handicaps like pity and mercy," Shockwave replied. "Such things have only served to rot even the greatest kingdoms."

At this, Megatron grinned devilishly.

"Well, Shockwave," he said, holding a hand out. "Welcome to the ranks of the Decepticons."

Shockwave shook the hand, thus signing the contract of servitude with his life. They both turned their heads when they heard approaching metal feet outside the jail area. They exchanged looks then quickly moved to the main jail entrance room where the police officers' desk was, as well as the wall-bound lockers for prisoners' belongings.

"My weapons are in one of these lockers," Megatron said.

Shockwave lifted his gun hand and began to shoot out the locker doors. He only had a few open when the remains of the door he had blown in became flooded with Autobot soldiers. Shockwave looked over at the soldiers and his optic fell on a large gun that one of the soldiers held. It was more of a field automatic weapon, but why it was out of its place did not matter. He quickly scanned the gun, encompassing it in a purple net of scanning lasers as he configured the gun's schematics to his own transforming sequence, erasing the now-moot Cybertronian muscle car transforming sequence.

He transformed into the gun, letting numerous parts of him shrink and disappear into a sub-space storage dimension to complete the transformation. He dropped into Megatron's hands, making the rebel rear his head back slightly in surprise. But he understood and gritted his teeth plates as he opened fire on the soldiers. Shockwave's superior fire power, given an extra boost by the radioactive power cell with in him, easily felled the soldiers, leaving the room eerily silent. Megatron released Shockwave and Shockwave transformed back into his robot form, landing in a single-kneed kneeling position on the floor.

Shockwave stood and turned, only to see Megatron ripping apart the lockers with his bare hands. Shockwave's ear fins twitched in surprise at the savagery and strength of the younger mech. Now that Shockwave saw this mech in the metal without distractions, Shockwave had to admit that Megatron was much younger than he, but the seriousness he carried was quickly aging him into a harder mech. Shockwave had straggling students who were just under Megatron's age.

_He will need proper guidance in the coming days,_ Shockwave decided. _Not just upgrades._

Megatron released a sigh of contentment as he finally loaded his arm cannon back into its rightful port on his arm. He flexed his arm then smirked as he shot at the wall. Shockwave jumped in surprise at the shockingly loud boom that sounded out as the arm cannon blew over half the wall out, letting them look out to the sky beyond. Some where deep in Shockwave's processor, he asked himself if he was sure about working with Megatron. But logic declared that there was no going back and killed the voice, never allowing it to speak again.

Shockwave looked at Megatron, amazed at the young mechs' strength. Megatron walked over to the hole he had created and leaned out into the night sky, looking down at the street below. Civilians and passer by were collecting to see what the ruckus at the police station was about. Megatron turned to Shockwave and grinned.

"Shall we go?" he asked.

Shockwave nodded and the two accessed their hover abilities and flew into the night.

**Author's Note: Don't forget that you can request specific characters' origins! But not Earth-origins, like the Dinobots or Constructicons. ^_^)**


	3. Skyfire

**Disclaimer: Transformers belongs to Hasbro. All recognized culture references, items, etc, belong to their rightful owners. This story is for entertainment and not commercial purposes.**

**AN: This chapter and the next are directly connected.**

**Chapter 3: Skyfire**

The golden light of the sunny day seeped through tall windows, lighting up the tall-shelved library with in. Rows and rows of plastic and metal pads glittering with holographic pages lined the shelves. Several of these hologram books were stacked on a table around a young white mech with small red and blue accents. He heard a clopping of metal boots and looked up to see three young mechs his age enter the library. The young boy mechs all had identical body types, differing only in color. They scrambled around each other, two snickering eagerly and the third looking around nervously as they quickly ducked behind some shelves. They whispered to each other, ignorant of the forth mech in their midst.

"Nice work, Skywarp," the red and white Sparkling snickered, "Oh man, the old hose is going to be _so_ mad!"

"Thanks, Starscream, my pleasure," Skywarp chuckled back.

"Didn't your dad tell you not to use your teleportation abilities for mischief?" the third, dark blue and black boy asked nervously.

"Oh, don't be such a party pooper, Thundercracker!" Skywarp whispered. "Besides…"

Thundercracker gasped as Skywarp disappeared with a pop and a flash of purple before reappearing behind Thundercracker, throwing an arm around the startled boy's neck. A sly grin crossed Skywarp's face.

"I know what I'm doing," he finished.

Stomping feet approached the library and the three mechs shushed each other, shrinking deeper into the shelves' shadows. The doors slammed open and a large, aged, dark grey mech stomped in, blue and red accent lights flaring.

"Where are they!?" he roared. "Where are the piles of scrap that threw all my work out the window? I need those to be prepared for the Cybertron Counsel meeting tomorrow! What good is a Counsel Mech when he fails to be informed because of some kitchen boy brats!?"

In the shadows out of the elder mech's sight, Skywarp giggled nervously while Thundercracker shivered slightly in fear of the large mech's wrath. Starscream's pinkish red optics widened in obvious terror and trembled enough to almost make his metal plating rattle. The elder mech turned to the silent boy studying at the table.

"Oh, hello, Skyfire," he greeted. "I am sorry to disrupt your studies like this, but those three kitchen boys have gone too far and have thrown all my reports and files out the window! Have you seen them?"

Skyfire flanked behind his father and saw the aforementioned kitchen boys shaking their hands and heads and mouthing "no". Thundercracker even had his hands clasped together as he mutely pleaded for Skyfire's silence.

"N-No, father, I have not seen them," Skyfire lied.

"Well, then, I'll catch them soon enough," Skyfire's grumbled, turning away and exiting the library. "That's the _last_ time I take in street turbo-rats for employment…"

After the enraged mech had left, the three pranksters came out of hiding.

"Hey, book worm, thanks for covering our aft for us," Starscream, going over to clap Skyfire on the back. "Name's Starscream and these are my buddies, Thundercracker and Skywarp."

"Are you brothers?" Skyfire asked, "You look identical."

"Nah, but Thundercracker's mom may have made some siblings for Thundercracker with some unnamed mechs," Skywarp laughed, elbowing Thundercracker in the side.

"Hey, that's my mother you're talking about!" Thundercracker snapped, swatting Skywarp upside the head with a hard metallic clang.

"You never even knew her!"

As Skywarp and Thundercracker proceeded to wrestle on the floor, Starscream looked over Skyfire's shoulder at the hologram text he was studying and the digital pad of mathematics that Skyfire was practicing it. He picked up the pen and quickly scribbled a correction into the math problem.

"Carry the one here," he said, "And in this old of a text, 'provide' means multiply, not divide. Work like so and… ta da! The problem gives you a logical answer."

"You are unusually intelligent for a kitchen boy," Skyfire said, examining the corrected math. "You should join the servants' children tutor plan."

"Boring," Starscream yawned, "I'd rather run around pinching currency where I can and live free."

"But you have so much potential!" Skyfire pointed out.

"We're barely past being Sparklings, the both of us, there's no rush," Starscream said, shrugging.

"The best place to start education is when you're young is what my father says," Skyfire claimed.

Starscream mocked a yawn.

"Look," Skyfire said, getting an idea, "Let's make a deal: You join the tutor program and get an education and I'll talk my father out of killing you for his lost files."

Skywarp appeared with a pop and purple flash beside Starscream, clutching the young mech's stub of a wing fearfully.

"You _gotta_ do it, Screamer! You _gotta_!" Skyfire begged. "I'm too young to die!"

"Fine, fine, I'll do it!" Starscream yelled, shaking the black and purple mech off of him. He shot a look at Skyfire, "This better be worth it, tiny, or I'll—"

Skyfire stood up then, becoming a full head and shoulder height higher than Starscream. All three kitchen boys' jaws dropped as their optics widened in surprise. Skyfire smiled a little in amusement at the reactions.

"My name is Skyfire," he said. "Not tiny."

- - - - -

"I can't _believe_ that we've come this far," Starscream muttered. "Wait, correction: I can't believe I've _held on_ with you this long, Sky! I mean, slag, what am I doing here? How did I get here?"

"I kept convincing you not to drop out of school," Skyfire chuckled, "Through private school, the Autobot Academy, and the Cybertronian University of Scientology, I kept you going."

"Yeah, I wish you would have stopped at private school, because I _really_ hate this job."

"It's a decent job, Starscream. We get paid for doing what we love to do: Study the biological life forms of the fleshing races!"

"That's what _you_ love to do, Skyfire," Starscream sighed. "_I_ like to be the one on top."

"That would be an easier goal to reach if you didn't suck up to the boss every time he catches you bad mouthing him."

"A mech has his priorities for survival!" Then, changing the subject, he said, "Hey, what ever happened to the creepy upgrades teacher? He just kind of disappeared after Peppermetal got off lined."

"According to the school gossip, Dr. Shockwave killed Peppermetal, stole the school funds, and joined the Decepticons."

"Wow," Starscream whistled, "That explains why the intuition fees _multiplied _over the vacation. It's always the quiet ones that snap the hardest, huh?"

"In that cast, you would not snap at all for all your noisiness," Skyfire chuckled.

To help pay their intuition at the Cybertronian University of Scientology, Skyfire and Starscream had gotten jobs as in-the-field scientists who explored the farthest reaches of space for new planets to study. Skyfire actually looked forward to the weeks away from Cybertron so that he and his partner could examine and measure the properties of a new planet. Starscream, on the other hand, constantly complained of the less-than-glorifying work and only came along for the sake of making a living. He would much rather be back on Cybertron fighting in the growing war between the rebel Decepticons and the Autobots.

"_Another_ organic planet," Starscream yelled, "What do I look like, a vet!?"

"Oh, come on, Starscream," Skyfire shushed, "It's no different than the other planets we ordinarily examine: It is a new planet and hence, we must study it briefly to determine its status with Cybertron."

"It's an _organic_ planet and it poses _no_ threat to Transformers _whatsoever_," Starscream groaned, "And the day an organic can hurt a Transformer is the day I meet an at least semi-intelligent bionic fleshling."

"_Will you just shut up, Starscream?"_ the mech watching the two from Cybertron sighed, _"You're always complaining. It wouldn't be half bad if your voice wasn't so damn __annoying…"_

"Oh, cram it, Com-Mech," Starscream snarled, calling the watcher by a nickname, "This job's stupid and you know it."

"_Then why don't you quite?"_

"Yes, Starscream," Skyfire agreed, flying close to Starscream, "It would seem logical to quite a job you do not desire."

Starscream growled as his tetra jet alt form flipped over in frustration. Skyfire was in his large cargo jet form and the two were flying through deep space towards their latest assigned planet; a little organic ball of water that was a bit farther out of Transformer territory than what was comfortable.

"You two don't get it," Starscream hissed, "It's not just that I hate the job, but I just hate the situation over all!"

"Your logic is failing to be logical," Skyfire stated.

"_I don't get you,"_ Com-Mech admitted.

"This is boring!" Starscream shouted in frustration, "Work! Work! Work! Work and no glory! Work and no credit! Work and no-no-nothing _more_!!! Haven't you ever wished for something more than just going in continuous circles of work, relax, work, relax? Haven't you ever wished to _control_ something? To have mechs look up to you? To have femmes chase after you? To have _power_??"

"_You've been hitting the energon bars again, haven't you?"_ Com-Mech asked, clearly showing that he had never had these wishes.

"Maybe you should go into politics?" Skyfire asked.

Starscream began flipping over and over as he screamed in frustration, making the other two mechs' audio receptors ache. Suddenly, a prickly static feeling rushed over them as they approached a planet largely taken up by blue waters and white clouds.

"_Guys?"_ Com-Mech called, _"I'm starting to—__**shh-k!**__—interference—__**shhh**__—can't--- __**crackle.**__"_

"Well, that's useless," Starscream snarled, snapping off his communications link.

"It appears that this planet's sun is a violent one," Skyfire commented turning his jet nose in the direction of the distant ball of fire. "We are receiving solar flare interference."

"Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's just get this over with," Starscream sighed, approaching the planet. "Slag, look at all that water. I hate water. The atmosphere must be pretty strong to be keeping it all in.

"Wait," Skyfire cautioned, "The solar flare interference, coupled with the strength of this planet's atmosphere might result in a natural electro-magnetic pulse and knock us off line, and who's to tell when we'll come back on line? Starscream, come back!"

"Make me," Starscream snarled, making Skyfire follow him into the thin night-time air of the atmosphere over the planet's northern pole, "I just want this stupid job done!"

But at that moment, a solar storm hit.

An aurora flared to life around the Transformers, casting blue and green light off of their metallic exteriors, reflecting and glowing around them like some magic curse. The living machines' sensitive electric currents picked up the energies violently cascading around them and both transformed instinctively as they shouted in pain. Starscream was mostly red, with white accents and a black helmet. Skyfire was mostly white with red and blue accent, out sizing his partner easily.

Now they both shouted and writhed in the cold air of the planet atmosphere, their rockets put-putting desperately to force them selves to work and take the robots back into the vacuum of space. Starscream was smaller and lighter; he was able to force his attention into one pin point and rocketed into the sky, back out into the safety of space. Skyfire, though, cried out in pain one final time, being unable to rocket back into space, and all his lights dimmed out as his engine silenced. He plummeted through the air, falling down through the sky for a good few minutes before crashing into the ice and snow far, far below. Starscream hovered above the planet, panting as he called out to Skyfire.

"Skyfire, are you there?" he called, "Skyfire, answer me, Skyfire!"

But Skyfire's off line body was silent, and it would not speak for many centuries to come, when certain accidents in the future would resurrect it.


	4. Starscream

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers. Any recognizable culture references, songs, etc belong to their rightful owners. This story is purely for entertainment purposes and any commercial usage of it is punishable by law.**

**Chapter 4: Starscream**

Starscream was still quite shaken at Skyfire's demise by the time he had made his slow way back to Cybertron all alone. He had never even bothered contacting the science headquarters again, not knowing what to tell the scientific headquarters about Skyfire's absence. Skyfire, as far as he knew, was dead. That damn organic planet had taken him without even having to send a beast after them. Starscream and Skyfire had had many close calls before; metal-hungering giant organics with sharp teeth was more abundant than what should be comfortable, giant spiders, giant tentacle monsters, lots of giants. But this time they had not been so lucky in escaping the power of an organic planet…

"Halt!" a voice suddenly bellowed as Starscream landed at the Cybertronian air port.

Skyfire instantly folded out of his jet form and landed, looking around nervously. The dark Cybertron sky glittered with skies and city lights over the large expanse of metallic pavement making up the air port. Around Starscream, an occasional late-night flyer landed on the pavement. Some Transformers' alt-forms needed a little time to slow down before safe speeds for transformation were reached, hence the run way. A couple of large, deep green Transformers approached with the Autobot guard brand on their chests. They didn't look very experienced, but had a guard's classic hostility floating around them.

"Identification," one of the guards grunted, holding a gun-grey metal hand out.

"Identification?" Starscream echoed dumbly.

"Yes, it's been ruled that any mech coming onto the planet must go through a specific check point or present identification proving that they are not Decepticons."

"You mean those back ally rebels are already making a big fuss? I thought that _Cybertron's Finest_ would kick them out with in the next month." Starscream said, sneering disdainfully as he pulled his piloting license from a chest compartment and handing it to the guards. "And I had more confidence in the Autobot guard—"

"Hey, this is the guy that the news has been talking about," the guard Starscream had handed his ID to, exclaimed to his comrade.

"What?" Starscream asked, terror jumping into his Spark.

_I've been missing and Skyfire's dead,_ Starscream thought. _I was in a bad mood when someone last heard from us. They might think that I killed Skyfire!_

"Yeah, you and Skyfire's disappearance on a science expedition made it to the news," the guard said. "It said you were in poor spirits before solar interference cut into the line and you cut it off. Where's scientist Skyfire?"

Starscream told the guards about the encounter with the planet, but the talkative guard snorted to show his disbelief.

"So a bunch of pretty lights knocked a giant like that out of the sky?" the guard grunted.

"It's true!" Starscream exclaimed.

"Alright, mister, you'll have to come with us," the guard said, drawing out a pair of wrist shackles from his belt.

Starscream acted on instinct then. After all, in spite of his educational record, he was still born and bred from a line of mechs who had frequently fallen back on cunning only when force failed.

He kicked a leg up, striking the speaking guard in the side of the head. As the first guard fell, Starscream turned and quickly struck at the second with his fists. Other guards at the jet-Transformer airport came running to help their comrades. Starscream looked around before seizing up one of the unconscious guards' guns. He fumbled with it and his finger brushed the trigger, accidentally making the gun spit a ball of red laser at an approaching guard, knocking them off their feet.

"Woha!" he exclaimed, spinning the gun around and shooting it at another mech. Starscream had never wielded a gun before.

A large mech snuck up behind Starscream. Starscream looked up in time to receive a massive fist across the cheek, knocking him to the metallic pavement as energon filled his mouth. A sharp pain ran through his wrist as someone kicked the gun out of his hand. Starscream picked up his spinning head and looked up to see the massive guard mech standing over him, aiming a gun right at Starscream's face. Starscream's life flashed before his optics.

His family hadn't been rich, but it hadn't been poor, either. As one of the cleverest boys in his neighborhood, he had been addicted to the rush he got when other kids in his neighborhood obeyed his orders when he called out for a certain scheme. When his father had lost his job as a minor Counsel Mech's body guard do to sickness, Starscream had been forced to take a job as another Counsel Mech's mansion as a kitchen mech. There, he had met two comrades that he found easy to manipulate: The nervous Thundercracker and the jokester Skywarp. From there, Skyfire had dragged Starscream down the pathway of knowledge, leaving Thundercracker and Skywarp behind. Starscream had not come back home after leaving for college, not even when the sickness his father had suffered had killed him. Starscream was crafty, cowardly, and selfish. Because of those traits, he had acted brashly and it appeared that he was about to die alone…

Just as the flash back ended, a loud boom sounded out and in the same instant, the mech over Starscream was knocked aside, leaving behind a stream of energon. Starscream sat up even as the fallen guard's energon splattered his legs and the roar of engines filled the air. Plunging from the sky, he saw, were Transformer aircraft; dozens upon dozens of them, all branded with the Decepticon insignia and coming down to fight the guards.

From the cock pit of one of the air craft leaped a large grey gun; a model of a certain powerful, hard-to-come-by rifle. As it came down, Starscream realized that it was coming to _him_ and stood up, ready to run if the gun almost fell on him. At the last moment, the gun transformed into a tall grey mech that Starscream had recognized on the news as the leader of the Decepticon rebels. Neither mech remembered each other from their Autobot Academy days, when they had been minor acquaintances. Too much had happened in between to allow them to remember such mundane relationships.

"I thank you, Autobot, for providing the _distraction_ my mechs needed to approach the air port without being shot down," Megatron told Starscream in a mocking, raspy voice. "As thanks, I will let you live."

"I'm not an Autobot," Starscream snapped, remembering how the guards had been so ready to kill him.

"Then what are you?" Megatron grunted.

"I am Starscream and I am a Decepticon!" was the bold reply.

"Are you now?" Megatron cackled, making Starscream's energon boil in annoyance.

Megatron knelt, picked up a guard's gun and tossed it to Starscream.

"If you _are_ a Decepticon," Megatron sneered, "Then you should be able to _fight_ like one."

"Fight!?" Starscream exclaimed, "I'm a scientist, not a warrior!"

"Then you are of no further use to me," Megatron grunted, turning away.

"Hold on, hold on!" Starscream exclaimed, taking to the air, "Let me see if I can learn…"

A battle shout sounded out at that moment and a rush of air port guards swept into the run way field, shooting laser fire at anyone who so much as _looked_ like they were apart of the Decepticons. Starscream yipped and did a flip in the air, avoiding a laser shot, then spun around and almost lost control avoiding another shot. He ducked yet _another_ shot and finally spun around to face the guard force.

_"Stop shooting at me!!!"_ he screamed, shooting blindly into the crowd.

Before Starscream knew it, three mechs had fallen under his lucky shots. He landed hard, breathing heavily, then turned and saw Megatron smirking at him.

"Congratulations, Starscream," Megatron said. "You're in."

**AN: To those who have been requesting Soundwave: His origin will be announced in exactly four chapters, **_**after**_** we see the Cassetticons' origins.**

**Also; you'll have to wait a little while to see the origins of Skywarp, Thundercracker, and the Seekers. Just a little FYI. ^_i) Remember: You can request any NON-Earth-birth Transformer origins (so no Dinobots or Constructicons)!**


	5. Ravage

**Disclaimer: Transformers is owned by Hasbro and this story is strictly for entertainment, non-commercial purposes only.**

**AN: This is in connection with the next three chapters, being the creation of Soundwave's squad. **

**Chapter 3: Ravage**

He had never truly known freedom. He remembered being a kitten, then, when he had been old enough to be taken from his mother without problems, he had been taken. Ever since then, he had lived his life in a cage. Sometimes the cage was big, sometimes small, but it was always a cage, no matter who his owner passed him to. He didn't care; after all, he had never known anything else. His life seemed simple enough, too: Just sit in the cage, look pretty, and wear what ever stupid collars the master put on him, even if it was too heavy, or tight, or noisy with bells, or ugly. As long as he could survive, he was content, as was the way of any typical animal.

Life under the most current master was no different: He had a decently sized cage equipped with some dull, kitten-like toys and was fed regularly. This master called him Takun. Takun, honestly, what kind of idiotic name was that? Oh well, it made no difference to the robot panther, as he knew what would happen: This rich master would loose interest in him or it would suddenly become more fashionable to own some other tamed beast and he would be sold or given away to the next master. But for the love of food, not another zoo; those things had such _crude_ living conditions, not to mention the annoying Transformer Sparklings that always pointed and laughed too loudly whenever he rolled over on the ground to satisfy a scratch on his back…

Takun heard the door of the hall in which his cage was set open. The animals in the other cages hardly acknowledged the entrance of their Master and his guest; they were dumb enough that if he had no food, he was not important. Humph; sometimes Takun envied the other animals' ability to just zone out of reality for days on end, day dreaming of some further life. It would relieve Takun's boredom that often snuck on him.

Takun began to bathe himself as his Master stopped in front of his cage. He looked up and saw that the Master had his male off spring with him today. Takun had rarely seen the offspring, but in the few times he had, he had learned something: That the offspring was a spoiled brat. The offspring shouted, whacked at the cages with sticks, and vainly attempted to pet the more docile and "cute" creatures. It was always a headache-maker when ever the offspring came to visit the caged beasts.

Now the Master said something happily to the offspring and the offspring cheered. Takun stopped bathing the instant he saw the Master give his offspring the key to Takun's cage. He hadn't… He hadn't… _given_ Takun to the offspring, had he?

The offspring's overjoyed jumping and shouting signaled an agreement. Takun growled and retreated to the other side of the large bench he had in his cell for climbing exercises. Takun recognized some of the words, as they were tricks on of his original masters had taught him when he was kit; orders like "sit", "play", "roar" or even "roll over". It appeared that the new owner wanted Takun to do tricks, but Takun would never embarrass himself doing tricks for someone who did not have at least as much dignity as he had.

Now the Master laughed and clapped a happy hand on his offspring's back before leaving. The offspring watched the Master leave then grinned like a demon at Takun. It looked like a challenge of who was the alpha male to Takun, and while Takun was content to be a pet, he would be damned if he were going to let this snot-nosed _scrap head_ was to be _his_ alpha.

Something flickered in Takun, making him place his feet apart and lower his head. His metal jaws drew back to reveal rows of gleaming sharp teeth beneath as a low rumble, deeper than anything he had ever done before. He had thrown a challenge right back at the offspring: If the little brat wanted to order Takun around, then he'd have to come prove his _strength_ first.

The offspring turned down the challenge by backing away from the cage, fear clear on his face. Ravage relished the smell of terror coming from the short, tubby off spring. The boy quickly fled the cage hall and Takun sat back, satisfied with his victory. Odd, though, he had never felt that instinct to challenge another creature's ownership over him…

* * *

The Brat (Takun had heard that name be tossed around from the pet care takers more than enough times in his life here when they appeared to be speaking of the Master's son), came back several more times after that first encounter. For a long time, even though he appeared to be talking big to Takun, he always did so from the other side of the hall. Eventually, though, he seemed to remember that Takun was trapped inside a cage and gradually came closer. The first day he tried whacking a stick into the bars and make Takun do a trick, Takun had been napping. Takun had heard the clang of metal on metal and a rage unlike anything he had ever felt before raged up in him, making him pounce towards the bars as he roared in rage, claws drawn in anger.

The Brat had fled, wailing, and the other animals, set off by the wild roar and the Brat's defeat, had crowed, howled, screeched, and roared in approval. They had forgotten about it by the time dinner rolled around, of course, being too dumb to keep it in their mind, but the memory stayed fresh in Takun's mind, making him strut back and forth proudly in his cage… until he noticed that, even though the animal care takers had left, he had not been fed.

Odd, the superior robot race and Masters had always fed Takun, always! Where were his energon kibbles now?

He had meowed loudly for several hours, calling for food, until he had made the connection. The Brat had his ownership and had probably withheld Takun's food as punishment for defeating him. Hence, Takun went to sleep, unhappy and hungry, but recognizing the vanity in attempting to call for food.

Hence two more days passed as such, with each half day making Takun more and more agitated. Was the Brat going to starve him to death? What kind of an alpha male bests his foe through starvation instead of paw-to-paw combat? And why was Takun thinking of fighting? How did Takun even _know_ about that concept?

The conflict stirred with in Takun had awoken some inner instinct with in him, making him more agitated, more energetic. Some how, Takun knew that he was not supposed to be locked away in a cage, like he had been content to be with all his life. Somehow, he suddenly knew that feeling the writhing body of a fresh kill beneath him with its throat in his jaws was better than any dull energon-laced kibble he had ever tasted before. Somehow, for some reason, Takun wanted to be _free._

* * *

Takun was getting weak, he could feel it; his naps were longer and it was becoming more difficult to stand up and walk around any more. So tired…

He heard the metal door opening, but refused to move. If it was just the cage keepers coming to clean out the cage like they usually did every other week, then he didn't need to move. But the Brat's scent drifted into his muzzle and he opened an optic. Sure enough, there was the Brat. It was late at night, so all the other animals were asleep. The Brat grinned as he came into Takun's cage and knelt beside him. Soft chatter came from the young robot, making Takun think that he was trying to be nice.

His optics brightened when the Brat took a small container out from a compartment at his waist and opened it. The smell of fresh food drifted from it. Takun forced himself to sit up, reaching for the container. The Brat stood up, though, and held the container over Takun's head. Now the soft chatter turned into a taunting gait, making Takun's ears lie back in anger.

The boy was mocking him? Here he was, weak and unfed with the cure to both ailments in the boy's hand and the boy was mocking him? Didn't the idiot know how painful it was to have one's stomach empty of food? Didn't he know how cruel it was to taunt another creature with food? What did he want from Takun, he was defeated What did he want?

To beg…

To beg, Takun realized, he wants me to beg.

That was it.

Caged, tamed, underfed, and forced to do tricks, a rage Takun had never felt before leaped from with in him, telling him how wrong this all was. He was ment to be prowling in the shadows of a metal jungle somewhere, stalking the young and weak and establishing his territory! He was supposed to be making two-legged mechs tremble in fear while he prowled around their camp! He was supposed to be a king of the jungle, not some treat-begging _pet_!!

With this new fire burning in him, the black and grey panthar-bot lunged at the Brat as pure rage roared from his jaws before they clamped down on the Brat's throat. The boy cried out briefly before they clattered to the floor in a crash of metal. Takun didn't even register the fact that he was out of a cage for the first time in his life; he was too busy ripping and tearing into the source of his distress, devouring what he did not spit out and sating his hunger. The other robot animals awoke from their slumber upon hearing the deadly cries and were now howling and roaring at full pitch in excitement. When Takun's empty stomach was full, he got off of his prey and sat by it, energon dripping from his muzzle as he stared down at the mangled body.

He didn't feel regret or fear for what he had done. Why should he? He was hungry and he had eaten.

Things moved quickly after that mental statement. The Master and several of his protectors, his body guards, came and they began to shoot at Takun. Takun surrendered into instincts and ran at them, leaping clear over their heads and to the mansion beyond. Revived by the fresh food with in him, Takun was able to run around the luxurious, well detailed living quarters beyond the cage hall, find his way out of the mansion, and into the country land beyond. He stopped only when he could no longer hear the angry hisses of the weapons shooting at him, slowing to a walk in a moon-lit forest.

The outside world was noisy, making him jump with every distant bird tweet, every distant creature growl in the under brush. Overhead, trees with metallic, diamond-shaped leaves shuffled in the wind, making a noise like a scrapping can opener as the leaves brushed against each other. The ground was cold, rough, and hard beneath his paws. The night air chilled him and made him shiver.

He couldn't go back, he somehow knew, lest he be killed. He was on his own from now on, without a Master or caretaker to feed him. He would have to follow these new instincts with in him to find food, find shelter, and survive. He was slightly scared, but he would survive. And of his name? "Takun" was a name the two-legged mechs had given him, a name that was ment for a _pet_. He didn't want that name! He wanted a name that reflected his ferocity, his poweress, and how he could rip and ravage his victim's bodies, like he had done to the Brat.

Ravage...

Hmmm, it was a complicated name to a mere animal mech, but he had heard many two-legged mechs use that word around him when warning that he could harm any one who got too close to him. It sounded proper. True, no one else would be able to call him that, but at least he could name himself thus.

The a wirey bush shivered near by and the panthar-bot stopped, staring as a peculiar six-legged mechanical critter shuffled out of the bush and cross his path, sniffing the ground with a long tube nose. When the critter did not notice the panthar-bot and run, he sunk look onto his haunches, preparing for more practice of his hunting skills. When he was ready, Ravage leaped forward and onto the mechanical critter. A happy purr came from him when he caught the critter easily.

Ravage was looking forward to the free life.


	6. Laserbeak and Buzzsaw

**Disclaimer: Transformers is owned by Hasbro. This story is for entertainment purposes and not commercial. The writer does not claim ownership to the Transformers or any attached blessings.**

**Chapter 6: Laserbeak and Buzzsaw**

A narrow alley way, one of many, was blessed to receive the full grace of the rising sun as it rose over the city. An aging Transformer stepped out of a door at the end of the alley way, yawning and stretching his arms over his head as he became fully awake. Old systems inside of him chirped and hummed to life with slow speed and his inner cable joints creaked and cracked around crusty layers of dried oil and lubricants. He scratched his back as he looked about with content. The alley was clean, things were peaceful, the rebel war elsewhere is a far-off nightmare, and it looked like it was going to be a good—

A squirt of clear, gooey fluid landed on his shoulder.

"Damnit, you slagging, stupid birds!" the old mech screamed, jumping up and down in anger as he quickly whipped the bird doo away. Looking up, his grey optics flared in hatred at the red-black and yellow-black, hawk-like bird-bots perched on the edge of the building over head. The mech's old room mate had fed these birds their scraps for years, knowing how slim the pickings were for a couple of city hawks to pick up a turbo-rat when the city had been so bent on removing all pests. It seemed like the birds had not received the memo that their feeder's Spark had diminished and the only mech left was his cranky room mate.

"Get outa here, you stupid buzzards!" the elderly mech roared, picking up a trash can lid and throwing it up at the birds. "Go on, get; you stupid, organic-brained idiots!"

The birds got the idea and took wing, screeching in protest as they flew away from the building. This was the fifth day in a row that this had happened. Neither of the birds could deny it now: Their food keeper was gone or had ceased his generous ways.

The yellow and black bird bot chirped curiously to the slightly older red and black bird-bot, who was also slightly smarter than the yellow and black one. He had asked where they were going to get food. The red and black bird whistled and screeched a short reply: The old fashioned way.

Thus the two flew over the city streets, their sharp optics looking for any life form small enough for them to devour or at least take on together. Below them, they saw the vehicles of the Transformer humanoids passing by on their day-to-day schedules. Red-Black wondered what the big robots had done to receive such an easy life; they never seemed to go hungry, and they were always superior. But they always seemed so busy, too; perhaps that was the price for their fortune? Red-Black was smart, but there were just some things that escaped a bird's understanding.

Spotting no food, they flew east, out of the city, and into the country lands beyond where the more distinguished two-legged superior Transformers had their own mansions surrounded by country. Here, food was almost always more plentiful, but at the price of an increased risk from rival predators and two-legged hunters. Red-Black kept an optic out for the dangerous glint of a hunter's weapon or an approaching rival hawk-bot while Black-Yellow kept his sharp optics on the ground. Red-Black prayed that this would be a day where Black-Yellow was too hungry to be picky or fancy about how or what they hunted, or else they would be passing over suitable prey all day for Black-Yellow's perfect prey.

Suddenly, Black-Yellow screeched and dove downwards. He had spotted food!

Red-Black followed his friend without even pausing to see what Black-Yellow had spotted; food was food. Sure enough, Black-Yellow had spotted a nest of turbo-rats in an un-emptied dumpster behind a road-side restaurant where the two-legged Transformers stopped to eat.

Trash metal tinkled to the pavement as the two birds dove into the box of ruined cleaning clothes and in the midst of the metallic four-legged vermin. Over a dozen small, wire-covered rodent bodies leaped from the dumpster like gymnastic professionals and landed with a super-agent-style roll on the pavement before bolting off into the wilderness' brush or into a sewer entrance like the vermin they were. The turbo-rats that did not escape were grasped with in the claws and beaks of the greedily hungry birds. Red-Black spotted a tantalizingly large turbo-rat bounding for a hole in the main building. His optics flashed red before a brief shot of small red laser light flew from his optics and hit the turbo-rat head on, making it collapse to the ground, stunned.

Red-Black dropped his dead, captured prey with a happy cry and fluttered down to the ground, ready to dig into the meager meal. Before he could, though, a savage snarl sounded out and Red-Black was forced to flutter back as a giant black cat robot bounded out from the woods and dove on the turbo rat meal.

The feline was enormous by the birds' standards, and was severely dented and dirty in many places. Wild life had been hard on the animal, like all wild creatures. Red-Black and Yellow-Black exchanged surprised looks, having never seen such a large feline robot in or near their city before. But their animal instincts ruled what they should do: The feline was bigger, the feline got the food.

Taking what food they still kept, Black-Yellow and Red-Black fluttered on top of the dumpster and ate while the feline did the same below. When all had eaten the feline got up and began to move off. Red-Black pecked Black-Yellow on the head, bringing the vain bird away from his preening, and followed Big Cat. Black-Yellow chirped curiously to Red-Black but Red-Black hissed, signaling silence.

Several hours later, Big Cat found a large mechanical wood land creature snacking on the diamond-shaped tin leaves of the forest trees. The Big Cat stopped and stared curiously at the tin-land creature, a pretty, slim creature with thin, dainty legs and a peculiar long, wide tail that the creature frequently used to fan itself. Suddenly, the creature raised its conical head, wire-bristle antennae perking up in surprise, and leaped forward with a frightened bleat. But too late a predator leaped from the woods, landing on the innocent creature's back and finishing it off with a quick nip to the spinal cables.

The predator appeared to be a hunting hound that had escaped its masters. The metal-hided hound looked up when it saw Big Cat staring and snarled in warning to keep off: The dead prey was _his_ food. Big Cat didn't like the challenge and attacked the dog. They fought and Big Cat finished the stray hunting hound off. So ferociously had the Big Cat finished off the hound that Black-Yellow and Red-Black instantly knew what a more appropriate name for the creature was: They had heard the two-legged mechs use the word when speaking about destruction. They decided to call the cat Ravage. Ravage moved on, clearly not caring for the carcass of the hound or the tin-land herbivore, but turned around curiously when Red-Black and Black-Yellow eagerly fell on the carcasses to eat.

Red-Black spat a small bone in Ravage's direction, clearly scolding him for wasting food. Ravage growled and stepped forwards the bird. Black-Yellow fluttered away fearfully, chirping in warning, but Red-Black spread his wings and hissed at Ravage, mistaking the angered advance for an attempt to regain the potential food he had wasted.

Ravage stopped and tilted his head to the side, amused at Red-Black's antics. He purred and lowered himself slightly before advancing a few inches; he wanted to share the food. Red-Black made a snobby coughing noise and turned back to the food; Ravage could have the food when he was done. Ravage sat, awaiting his turn, and an awed Black-Yellow rejoined Red-Black at their meal.

* * *

Hence the trio became a strange, mix-matched gang of unusually intelligent animals. The birds would scout out potential food, whether it was a dumpster of fresh leftovers thrown out from some meal house or another on the edge of the city or just a large, weak robot-dog. They would go back to Ravage and lead him to the prey. Ravage would take the prey down and together they would eat. It was a favorable relationship.

To make it even better, Ravage and the birds would protect each other while eating. If another city stray or wilderness animal tried busting into their meal, Ravage would use his superior size and strength to chase it off. If Ravage was sleeping when another stray tried to attack him or chase him out of his sleeping place, the birds would chase them off. They came to like each other, even call each other friends. The birds taught the cat about the outside world and they roamed from city to wilderness and back again several times in the year following their first encounter.

Eventually, they were forced to stick to the wilderness areas surrounding the excessively privelaged two-legged mechs' homes as rumors of the enormous cat prowling the city streets grew. They found an abandoned barn to live in and took that up as their own territory, chasing or hunting out the turbo rats and tin-land critters that had lived there before. It was a good life; they were well fed, they could trust each other, and they were more than smart and strong enough to repel whatever dared come at them. It looked like they were going to be a rare exception where wild animals actually lived to die of old age in their sleep.

But then one day…

* * *

A distant yap made Red-Black's red optics glow to life drowsily. He sat up in his nest in the rafters of the barn, looking around curiously. The walls of the barn were severely rusted, and many of the rafters were being eaten away by acidic rain, but it still provided enough shelter to keep the animals comfortable. Black-Yellow was napping in his own nest beside Red-Black. Red-Black looked down to check on Ravage, but was mildly confused when he did not see the wild cat-bot curled up in his grass nest in one of the stalls below. Red-Black knew that Ravage liked to be alone at times, but he would always be back by morning. Turning, Red-Black squawked loudly and pecked Black-Yellow on the head.

Hey, wake up, Ravage is missing! Was what he had said.

Black-Yellow chirped in annoyance and stirred as he woke up. Fear was growing in Red-Black as some instinct began flashing red lights in him. It was the same instinct that told animals when a storm was coming, or when something important was about to happen. With every passing second, it was beginning to yip louder and louder, making Red-Black an unusually jittery bird.

With an impatient cough-chirp, Red-Black leaped to his feet and swatted Black-Yellow hard enough on the head to emit a loud skittering of metal on metal. Suddenly understanding the seriousness of the situation, Black-Yellow spread his wings and screeched in his typical dramatic fashion. Black-Yellow flapped his wings and burst up from his nest, rocketing up through a hole in the ceiling. Red-Black, meanwhile, dropped down from the rafter and took the low path, gliding out of the open doors of the barn. Using their own mute communication systems, Black-Yellow flew high in the sky while Red-Black flew under the tree tops. Black-Yellow circled high over head, causing many small prey creatures to go into needless hiding. Mechanical herbivores started when the red and black streak representing Red-Black zipped by under the tree tops, making some of the branches stir restlessly. Neither bird was thinking about food: They were thinking about their friend.

Suddenly, Red-Black spotted a glittering of black meal in a clearing near by. His Spark flickered nervously with in him as he banked and spun about, approaching the black metal glint. When he got there, he circled over the source of the glitter. He tried to call for Black-Yellow, but his initial screech came out as a strangled gurgle. He got control of himself and threw his head up, screeching with excess volume for Black-Yellow to come. Black-Yellow, high in the sky, felt his own Spark sink as he turned and came to the source of the despair-filled called of Red-Black.

Ravage had been attacked while on a private night prowl. Judging by the wounds, it had been by a pack of wild hunting hound units. His head was splattered with his blue-purple energon, leaking from many lacerations in his stomach area, and in long streaks down his back. His rear right hip had an enormous crater in it from when some strong brute had ripped a generous piece out of Ravage, exposing the sparking cable systems beneath. But judging by the red-purple energon covering Ravage's paws and muzzle, and splattering the ground around the clearing, he had put up a better fight. In fact, on one end of the clearing the ravaged blue-grey and white body of a mutt canine unit was sprawled on the grass, a victim of Ravage's wrath. A thick trail of dimming red-purple energon showed that the other canine units had suffered quite a bit before retreating. But judging by how the cooling air flow wheezed in and out of Ravage, the canines had lost the battle, but won the war.

Red-Black landed beside Ravage and began to preen away some of the energon life force from Ravage's head with his peak, twittering sadly. Black-Yellow also landed, staring sadly at Ravage. Finally, the pride-filled bird hopped closer and began to preen away some of the energon on Ravage's muzzle. Ravage raised his head and growled weakly before dropping it down again. He was trying to assure the birds he was okay, but it was no good; they all knew that he was done for.

This was one of the reasons animals did not make pacts, Red-Black realized. They became attached together, but that only made the pain inside worse than any hunger or poison when one of the pact makers was killed by their cruel, cruel world.

As if to agree to Red-Black's inner statement of a cruel world, the rusting remains of fallen tin leaves made the birds look up towards the edge of the clearing. A two-legged mech had appeared there, propping a large cannon on his shoulder with one hand while he held some small wood land critter bodies by their tails in the other hand; this two-legged had been hunting when he had come across the animals. Red-Black knew what the large two-legged robot would do: The two-legged probably lived near by and would not like having a dying animal lying near his home and shoot him.

With this thought in mind, Red-Black spread his wings and hissed savagely at the two legged robot, making him draw back in surprise. Yellow-Black hopped over Ravage's body and stood half way between the feline and the two-legged, spreading his wings and screeching savagely. Red-Black made it clear that he and Black-Yellow were _not_ waiting to eat Ravage by returning to preening Ravage's head. The two-legged stood, staring curiously at the hawks that protected the dying feline without actually trying to eat it.

Red-Black knew that it was not smart to protect another animal if he wanted to survive. But Ravage deserved more than just to be shot and dragged away by some snobby, over-sized—

_I won't hurt you._

The words themselves had no meaning, but Red-Black jerked in surprise when he felt the soft touch in his own mind. Black-Yellow felt it too and they both flapped their wings, chirping wildly in fear. The two legged robot knelt down slowly and spoke to them in their minds again, but did not use words: He was friendly and wanted to help Ravage.

Red-Black looked at the two legged robot. He was blue and white with a white face mask and a red visor covering his face. Red-Black couldn't read the two-legged Transformer's hidden face but… he felt… friendly. Was that possible? Was there such thing as a two-legged that _cared_ for wild mech-animals?

The two-legged whispered something softly in a drab, dull tone and came a little closer. Red-Black really wanted Ravage to be okay, and this friendly two-legged appeared to know how to do it. Two-legged mechs were smarter than what Red-Black had ever been, so this one might know how to fix Ravage. But what if the two-legged captured and made Ravage a pet, or killed him off when he was too wild?

Red-Black carefully weighed the pros and cons of letting this two-legged attend to Ravage. Finally, he decided to take a gamble if it meant that the winning prize was Ravage's life. If he lost, well… either way, Ravage would have died.

Finally, he hopped off of Ravage.

The two legged locked the cannon on his shoulder and tied the captured hunting game onto the cannon before he gently picked Ravage up in his arms, turned around, and began walking away. Red-Black quickly hopped after him, fully intended on keeping and eye on Ravage while the two-legged made repairs. If the two-legged weird bot did anything bad to Ravage, Red-Black would peck his optics out.

Black-Yellow watched the trio depart for the two-legged robot's home. After a long moment, not knowing what else to do, he followed them.


	7. Frenzy and Rumble

**Disclaimer: Transformers is owned by Hasbro. This story is for entertainment purposes and not commercial. The writer does not claim ownership to the Transformers or any attached blessings.**

**Chapter 7: Frenzy and Rumble**

Every city has its down town area of slums where the worst of the worst crowds hang out at late at night. This was where desperate young femmes stooped low, violent muscle heads applied their own skill of violence as a source of income, and the black market dealers gathered for some card games and bragging sessions in shady bars. Here, it was a way of life to leap aside should a police-mech and a crook came speeding by in their alt-forms, and old-fashioned exhaust systems spewed steam up into the night sky from portals in the street, making the place stink to high heaven. This city was no different, and it was on this particular night that two new comers to the city ran into two old-time wanderers.

"I'm telling you, Thundercracker, this place is _perfect_ for us!" one of the new comers told his near-identical comrade. "Plenty of rough guys needing protection, the mercenary number is down and none of the cops or guards know our names yet!"

"You know, we wouldn't have had to run to the _other side of the planet_ if you had just remembered to turn your signal dampener on _before_ you teleported into a gem vault for the heist, Skywarp!" Thundercracker growled to his dark purple and black comrade, knocking Skywarp on the head.

"Eh, thieving's over rated, anyway," Skywarp told his dark blue and black friend with a dismissive shrug.

At that moment, the doors of a bar in front of the new-comer muscle heads burst open and two small robots that barely came up to the two large mechs' knees were flung out onto the sidewalk, landing hard on top of each other. The two jet-formers exchanged looks, then looked back at the little mechs that argued briefly as they untangled themselves.

"Wow," Skywarp said, rearing his head back as he stared at the little mechs. "I didn't know they let Sparklings start drinking that young!"

"Hey, we're no Sparklings!" the red-orange and black small bot snarled, leaping to his feet.

"Yeah," said the lavender one, getting to his feet, "We're Cassetticon Minicons!"

"Minicons, cute," Thundercracker snorted. "Good only for cleaning out the small areas and tucking into rich, stay-at-home femme's purses and living off of the decent-sized Transformers."

"Hey, you're identical," Skywarp said, "You two brothers?"

"Yeah," the first Minicon said, crossing his arms across his chest. "How about you two? You both match the _ugly_ department."

The insulter did not take his scarlet visor-covered optics off the two taken back mechs as he exchanged high-fives with his brother.

"Okay," Thundercracker snarled, approaching the Minicons, "Now that calls for a fight!"

"Back down, stupid, I don't wanna hurt ya," the red-orange and mech said, holding a hand out and shaking his head.

Thundercracker kept coming. The two Minicons exchanged grins then leaped surprisingly high up in the air.

"Psyche!" they shouted.

The lavender Minicon's arms transformed into pile drivers that he slammed into the ground upon landing. Skywarp and Thundercracker were knocked off their feet by the earthquake created by the impact of the pile drivers. The red-orange and black Minicon clenched his fists and bared his chest as a low, shaking tone emitted from his abdomen, causing the air to quiver and shake like an audio copy of the other Minicon's earthquake, making Thundercracker and Skywarp clutch their heads as they groaned at the new pressure in their heads.

"Forget this, Thundercracker, it's not worth it!" Skywarp exclaimed, grabbing his friend and running away.

"Boo yeah!" the red-orange and black Minicon whooped. "You can't mess with Frenzy!"

"And you can't rumble with Rumble!" the lavender Minicon declared.

Both knocked heads together before smacking a triumphant high-five.

"Come on, bro, let's see about getting us some energon and femmes at the bar on the corner," Frenzy said.

"Sounds good to me, Frenzy," Rumble agreed.

**Ten minutes later…**

"What d' ya _mean_ 'you don't serve Minicons'??" Frenzy screeched as he and Rumble were kicked out of another bar.

"That's the house rules, boys," the bar owner replied, "No Minicons unless escorted by decent-sized Transformers. Other wise, I'm not serving you little wastes of scrap metal. Your kind either cause too much trouble or it's not worth the trouble finding mugs tiny enough for you."

"Now that's just racist," Rumble growled.

"We happen to be _Cassetticons_, bub!" Frenzy snapped, his scarlet visor flashing in the street lights.

"Oh, are you, now?" the bar owner asked with a devilish smirk as he crossed his arms across his chest. "Where's you handler?"

Rumble and Frenzy exchanged looks before looking away awkwardly.

"I expect an answer," the bar owner growled.

"He… ditched us," Rumble said slowly.

"Ditched you?" the bar owner asked, raising a large metal eye brow.

"Rumble and I were… a little disobedient," Frenzy said.

"Actually, I think it's because I knocked him out so we could go partying that one night there was that big bash thing," Rumble pointed out.

"Well, it _was_ his birthday," Frenzy pointed out.

At that moment, the bar owner burst out into loud peals of laughter.

"Well, I never!" he laughed, covering his optics with a hand, "A couple of Cassetticons dumb enough to get kicked out by their handler! I can't believe it!"

"It was more complicated than that--!" Frenzy began.

But the bar owner had already gone back into the bar, leaving the two Cassetticons outside in the night.

- - - - -

An hour later, the brothers had put their pocket change together to buy a bag of energon chips and were strolling down a road taking them into the metal, diamond-leaved country. Out here, the silent was broken only by the occasional whistles and beeps of the night time cybernetic bug and the toot of a night time avian bird-like machine. Cybertron's distant satellites glittered over head.

"Hey, Rumble, are we supposed to be here?" Frenzy asked.

"Nope, it's private property to some rich slagger or another," Rumble replied, crunching on a glowing purple flake of hard energon.

"Oh," Frenzy acknowledged before stuffing a handful of chips in his mouth. Clearly, neither of the brothers cared for trespassing or authority.

"We're gonna need to find a job soon," Rumble said. "The money Rick-a-Shay gave us before kicking us out is almost out."

"_Is_ out, Rumble, _is_ out," Frenzy pointed out.

"What are we gonna do?" Rumble asked. "We've never been this far away from Rick-A-Shay this long! We've got no food, no money, no place to sleep and no idea what we're doing! I mean, we can keep sneaking into parties and crashing with the other party mechs, but that can only last for so long, you know?"

"I know," Frenzy said, licking his hand. "But, hey, Rick-A-Shay taught us how to use our powers and how to fight before he kicked us out for the, eh hee, _misunderstanding_, we're good at fighting, and we like fighting. Maybe we can become gladiators?"

"Yeah, right, they'll never hire us."

"Why?"

"Because we'd cause permanent mental trauma to the other guy," Rumble laughed.

"Yeah, that's what I'm talking about!" Frenzy laughed, smacking a high-five with Rumble. He looked into the bag and grimaced, "Oh, darn, we're down to the last bit. You want it?"

"Sure," Rumble said, taking the bag.

"You know, sometimes I'm almost sorry we did it," Frenzy said, looking out into the shadows of the forest. "Rick-A-Shay and the others were always annoyed about our pranks and fights, but it was friendly, you know? Just as long as we stayed out of trouble just enough to keep Rick-A-Shay or any of us from going to jail, we'd be okay. But then that whole _incident_ happened and we got ourselves kicked out…"

"Well, what's done is done and can not be undone," Rumble said, crumbling the empty bag up and tossing it over his shoulder carelessly. "Now we got no home, no income, and no idea what to do."

"All because you were just teaching me how to use my pile drivers," Frenzy sighed, shaking his head. "I know we both got 'em, but you're a _pro_ with them!"

"Thank you," Rumble stated. "Now if only we can some how harness our skills of mass destruction to snag us a job where people don't care about our size."

"Well, look on the bright side," Frenzy said, "At least we didn't get caught for killing a guy."

They both stopped walking and exchanged looks. A quiet snicker escaped them as their mouths wriggled in a suppressed smile, but they wound up falling on the ground laughing anyway.

"Oh, man," Rumble laughed, "We get kicked out of town for knocking down the local energon mart and everyone—everyone…"

"Everyone forgets about the guy inside," Frenzy cackled, "Oh man, it's sad, but it's just so damn _funny_!"

The two brothers continued laughing for several more minutes at the macabre joke, unaware of the yellow optics that glowed in the forest's shadows near by. Suddenly, a large black panther-bot leaped from the forest with a battle roar. A small rocket was clipped to its rear right hip, its claws and teeth were drawn out and exposed. Grey legs vibrating with energy were attached to a pure obsidian black body writhing with power. It was clear that such a magnificent warrior of nature was not supposed to be in such tame tin-wood lands. This creature was a foreign mechanical warrior, but all the brothers knew beyond that was that it was hostile and coming at _them_.

The two brothers sobered up instantly, leaping to their feet and out of the way of the panther-bot. The mechanical feline landed, turned and snarled at the two surprised Cassetticons. The brothers exchanged looks before looking back at the feline as their faces furrowed in determination and the eagerness for violence as they clenched their fists.

"You want to rumble, kitty cat?" Rumble growled as his arms turned into pile drivers.

A low growl sounded from the feline as it crouched, preparing to pounce.

"Then let's get ready to _rumble!!_" he whooped, slamming his pile drivers into the ground.

The cat was knocked clear off its feet with a surprised yip. Over head, two large robot hawks came into view from over the hill tops, one black and yellow and the other red and black. The red and black bird-bot's optics flashed before shooting out a pair of red lasers.

"Woha!" Frenzy shouted, dancing out of the way of the lasers. "Now _that's_ some natural ability!"

"Hold them off, I'm busy!" Rumble yelled while swinging a pile driver at the feline as it tried tackling him again.

"On it," Frenzy said, baring his chest and abdomen at the birds.

The birds were knocked from the air, screeching, as the frequency waves Frenzy emitted messed with their circuits. The red and black bird-bot landed while the black and yellow bird made a recovery and swooped high up into the sky, framing its silhouette against a distant mood for a dramatic lighting effect. The bird's war screech echoed through the forest before diving straight for Frenzy. Frenzy gasped at the speed of the bird's plummet and failed to act as the bird came right down on his shoulders, digging its hooked beak into his shoulder and knocking him to the ground with a loud cry of pain.

"Frenzy!" Rumble shouted fearfully when he heard his brother's cry.

Rumble made the mistake of turning his back to the panther-bot to check on his brother. The panther leaped upon him from behind, knocking him onto his stomach and biting into his back. He shouted in frustration, pain, and fear as he felt the metal teeth crunch into his shoulder metal, making metal screech on metal. For a moment, he saw the faces of all his friends from before: The dark blue and pink form of Rick-A-Shay, his and Frenzy's old handler, and the rainbow-colored song bird-bot, Harmony, with her brother, Bassnote. Then there was the cranky neighbor whose name Rumble could never remember— Copper Skin? Ion Hive? Something about metal and covering—but that neighbor had helped Rick-A-Shay on more than one occasion. Then there were all the other whacky people living in their apartment building, all of whom had helped the boys grown up, and all of whom had looked down from their windows sadly when Rumble and Frenzy had been kicked out when they had knocked down a market building. He would miss them, in spite of all their nagging rules and worries, and hoped that they wouldn't fret too much when they realized that he and Frenzy were never going to come crawling back…

"Rumble, Laserbeak, Buzzsaw: Return."

The bland, emotionless tone of the male speaker held no threat, promise, or even order, but the panther-bot and its avian comrades instantly left Rumble and Frenzy to rejoin the speaker in the shadows of the trees. The sound of transforming sequences sounded in the shadows soon after. Sitting up, Rumble powered down his pile drivers into arms and checked his back. Much to his surprise, he found that in spite of his worries, his back metal had scarcely been dented. Looking over to Frenzy, he saw that his brother had a cut on his neck, but nothing more. They exchanged surprised, confused looks, and looked over to the woods as a new Transformer strode out of them.

He was tall, broad shouldered, and strong in frame while possessing a large cannon on his shoulder, a red visor over his optics and a white face guard hiding his face below the nasal unit. His color scheme was dark blue and white, but appeared to be midnight blue and silver in the dim night lighting. The large glass door in his chest marked him a Cassetticon handler: Someone who could own and take care of Cassetticons on a special level of closeness and trust.

Upon recognizing this, Frenzy and Rumble reared their heads back as something like fear entered them. They knew that there were handlers out there who loved to fight Cassetticons against Cassetticons. Without Rick-A-Shay's coaching guidance, and with the recent ambush's miserable failure, the brothers knew that they would not be able to survive such an encounter on their own.

"At peace," the handler pleaded in his monotone voice again. "Inquiry: Location of handler."

"Uh, yeah, he couldn't handle us any more," Frenzy said, exchanging looks yet again with Rumble. "So, uh, he kinda kicked us out."

"Why?"

"Personal stuff, screw bag," Frenzy growled, "Look, cue to the chase, bub: What d' ya want?"

"Request: Become my Cassetticons."

"_WHAT???"_ Frenzy shouted, leaping to his feet. "After all _that_ slag--!"

"Hold on, Frenzy," Rumble hissed, turning his brother around. "Look, bro, Rick-A-Shay _ditched _us," Rumble whispered. "There's no talking around that. Did we knock down a building and killed a guy that was, apparently, not important enough to remember? Yes. But he was _family_ and he _abandoned_ us to take the heat off of himself.

"Now, we have no home, no food, no money, no place to go, no job, and no _idea_ about what we're gonna do," Rumble went on as he counted the items off on his fingers, "And this guy, as creepy as he is, is offering all of that to us by asking to be our handler. Now, I have _no_ idea why he wants _us_, but did you see the way his Cassetticons got us? So coordinated and--and--and—_bad aft!!_ We _need_ this, Frenzy, and, frankly, we've hit rock bottom. So, what do you say?"

Frenzy's optics scanned the ground in thought. After a moment, he shrugged and said, "Eh, if he doesn't like us, then we can just get kicked out again."

"We'll be the only Cassetticons in existence to be ditched by our handlers _twice_," Rumble snickered.

The two turned to the handler and nodded.

"Okay," Rumble said. "You got us. Now what?"

"Inquiry: Designations," their new handler asked.

"I'm Rumble, and this is my brother, Frenzy."

"I am Soundwave," their handler said, pressing a button on his shoulder and making his chest window open up. "Frenzy, Rumble: Come."

From there, it was a matter of reflex at responding to a command that they had been given thousands of times before. Frenzy and Rumble sprinted forward and leaped high in the air before transforming into their compact alt-forms. They slid into Soundwave's chest compartment and found themselves snuggly fit in along side Ravage, Laserbeak, and Buzzsaw in their alt-forms. In spite of the unusual situation at becoming the Cassetticons of a handler who had just recently tested them, they quickly snuggled in and became cozy and at home with in Soundwave. They had found a new home to come back to, and a new family to live among.

**AN: Alright, the next chapter is of the mech we've all been waiting for to see, and the origins of how his squad gets in with the Decepticons. I don't need to spell him out for you, do I? Stay tuned!**


	8. Soundwave

**Disclaimer:**** Transformers is owned by Hasbro. This story is for entertainment purposes and not commercial. The writer does not claim ownership to the Transformers or any attached blessings.**

**Author's Note:**** I'm not entirely confident if Soundwave actually had a telepathic connection with his Cassetticons, but it'll be added into the story because it's a popular element of Soundwave fictions and it fits in rather nicely to the story. **

**Chapter 8: Soundwave**

When he had been a Sparkling, his style of speech had thought to have been the incomplete vocabulary of a babe. As a young child, his lack of vocal expression was labeled off as shyness. Due to this denial of anything excess or strange about him, he grew up as a regular Sparkling: He played, he made silly mistakes like spill energon all over the place in an attempt to help his mother unit in the kitchen, and he was generally a cute kid. And, like most seemingly normal, cute little kids, he took the news of his being adopted with mild hurt and much confusion, but learned to live with it and moved on. It was when he was a teenager and his foster parents moved to a different town that things really changed for him.

Being the new kid in school with an attractive body frame, a declination to speak about his past, and an apathetic nature towards the politics of high school drama, Soundwave had been labeled the "strong and silent" type, attracting femmes by the dozen. It had been somewhat awkward at times when Soundwave would be in study hall or lunch and a femme would appear, leaning on his arm or hugging his neck as they laughed and giggled, buttering him up, but once he got over his hidden teenage nervousness, he found that he could rule the school. He found that it wasn't too difficult, either, seeing as how almost the entire teenage Transformer population was more concerned about being accepted and earning a good reputation.

He was attractive enough to merely ask any femme of his choosing to go out with him on any of the school dates. He was submissive enough to be popular among the jocks with alpha-male syndrome. The outcasts basked in his intelligence, and the teachers appreciated having a student who would always turn in their work on time without fail. He was a shockingly good fighter as well, making even the school bullies leave him alone. When he reached the Morphing years, the years when Sparklings became Transformers and grew into the ability to transform, as well as gain their own unique body frames and weapons, he had sprouted a large shoulder cannon that he had been forced to leave in the office every day before school started. He learned that carrying this shoulder cannon around out side of the school kept even the worst gang haters away from him and feeding his reputation as a mysterious, hansom, intelligent bad-aft loved by all.

But towards the end of his school years, when even the most undisciplined party animal was learning to get a job and accept responsibilities, people got the idea that Soundwave's strange, halting manner of speech was not him being shy or apathetic, but he was truly just speaking as he would. It was a rare characteristic labeled as "computer speech", named thus for the shared traits of emotionless simplicity in speech patterns. After that, many of Soundwave's comrades put distance between him and themselves, as if his official speech pattern made him a different creature. Soundwave did not care nor worry about the loss of social status; many of them had failed to express logic, a thing that Soundwave thrived on.

It was logical to call his foster parents "mother" and "father" and to tell them that he loved them because it was a way of expressing his thanks for their taking care of him. It was logical to accept invitations to parties and dances and to ask dates to them because it helped him make allies, or at least keep him from making enemies. It was logical to complete his homework and school projects as completing his education would assist him in future expeditions. It was logical to fight the bullies when they attacked him, as it would prevent further discomfort in the future. It was logical to carry his shoulder cannon around to discourage any unnecessary displays of violent behavior. Even as a child, it was logical to play because it would help him make mistakes and learn from those mistakes. Never had Soundwave acted on pure emotion without at least a kernel of logic behind his actions. Such a process of thinking helped him out in the rare times he was in trouble for fighting at school. He even deemed it logical to find his true parent units so that he may be able to learn what his true capabilities are as a Transformer.

His life was ruled by logic with out acceptation…Which would make it ironic that the job he had started at had no logic at all.

- - - - -

To Soundwave, it was the manipulation of various sounds at various speeds, frequencies, volumes, and pitches to fit into a sentence or mood without spoken words or moved actions. Alternating low and high tones at a steady one-two pace applied a sense of timing while the various over tones that repeated rarely aided in developing a specific body movement pattern to mimic the sounds, thus creating perfect harmony.

To everyone else, it was music.

"Who here likes our new music mix master, Soundwave, give a shout!" the youthful club owner whooped over the audio system.

The dancing crowd of young Transformers whooped aloud to show how much they liked Soundwave. In the DJ booth, Soundwave did not respond but merely decided that they had been on the same track long enough and that it was time to change. He moved dials up and down and turned knobs, effectively changing the club's music beat. He watched behind his red visor as the crowd's movement swayed into a different style as one, almost like the fluid motion of a Transformer's limb in transforming sequence. The laser lights continued flashing in the large, dark room lit up by heavily shaded neon windows in the wall with a section of tables around the bar across the room from the high up DJ booth Soundwave was in. Beside Soundwave stood Neonsight, the club's super bright yellow and pink owner and his new boss. Soundwave was still unsure of how he had obtained the job so easily, concerning the fact that all he did for the interview was drink energon and listen to Neonsight talk about his club and femmes, but he had gotten the job, none the less.

"They really like you, Soundwave, good job," Neonsight said, placing the microphone down before clapping Soundwave on the back. "I admit, you're kinda creepy, but you're totally what this club needs."

"Praise: Appreciated," Soundwave replied. It was the closest he would ever get to being bashful.

"Oh, slag," the club owner groaned, looking down on someone in the crowd. "It's Boomerspark."

"Inquiry: Identification of Boomerspark."

"What?"

"Who is Boomerspark," Soundwave asked, shoving each word out with considerable effort.

"He's a regular who doesn't pay for his drinks, has raked up a _huge_ tab, and causes trouble every time he comes in here," Neonsight said, drawing a small club from its position at his side. "You stay here while I try chasing him out."

Neonsight walked down the steps from the DJ balcony and approached a large, dark, dark blue mech with brawny shoulders and a huge chin. Peering at the mech that appeared to be Boomerspark, Soundwave diagnosed that Boomerspark was suffering from a case of an ego the size of his chin and shoulders with a side of incompetence and an infection of alpha male syndrome. All things were true if he thought that he had the authority to refuse payment to the club, not to mention the snide, confident smirk he had on his disproportionate face: It was a smirk Soundwave had seen on more than enough school bullies and gang fighters to recognize on any one.

Neonsight said some words to Boomerspark that went unheard with the booming bass notes and the hoot of the techno-like Transformer music. Boomerspark laughed and shoved at Neonsight, making the club owner stumble back a few paces. To Soundwave, it would be logical to stand up to Boomerspark to please Neonsight and make a good impression. It could even lead to a promotion or a raise in his pay check so soon after getting the job.

In moments, Soundwave had come down the steps and appeared behind Neonsight, standing with a usual straight rigidness that most generals in the Autobot Army of Cybertron would spend weeks whipping into their new recruits. Neonsight looked up, as if surprised that Soundwave had come so fast, but Boomerspark merely smirked at Soundwave.

"What?" Boomerspark asked, shouting over the music, "Think you can take me, mask face?"

"Affirmative," Soundwave replied.

"Alright then," Boomerspark said, stepping back while two other mechs, unseen comrades of his, cleared a space for the pompous mech.

"I should have known it would come to this," Neonsight growled. "Soundwave, is there anyway I can talk you out of this?"

"Inquiry: Engage in violent activity yourself?" Soundwave asked.

"Ah ha, no, not really," Neonsight said, scratching the side of his head with one hand while he looked at his small club. He placed it back at his hoop as he admitted, "Nah, I'm no fighter. Just don't get busted up too much, okay, 'Wave?"

"Acknowledged," Soundwave answered.

As if the agreement had been a fighting bell, Boomerspark struck a gauntlet of a fist out, striking Soundwave in a white face masked-cheek. Soundwave's head snapped up as he took a step back, but he shook his head and regained his feet.

"Logic: Strike without opponents' acknowledgement for additional damage," Soundwave said, looking at Boomerspark.

Boomerspark punched again, but this time, Soundwave was ready for him. He caught the fist as he dodged it.

"Superior logic…" Soundwave went on.

He ducked under Boomerspark's arm and came back up behind the hostile club comer, dragging Boomerspark's arm with him. Boomerspark began to yip in pain as the cables and framework in his arm protested against being dragged this far back.

"Waiting until opponent acknowledges fight to avoid opponent's anger-fueled vengeance," Soundwave finished.

There was a loud snapping noise that made the entire club freeze in surprise. Boomerspark screamed in pain while Neonsight and the other eye witnesses dropped their jaws and widened their optics in shock after Soundwave snapped Boomerspark's arm

"What the slag are you aft heads waiting for!?" Boomerspark screamed shrilly at his comrades, "Get him!"

The two mechs who had cleared the fight space for Boomerspark came at Soundwave as one. Soundwave shoved the broken Boomerspark to the floor in front of him and turned to face his two new opponents. He ducked the first blow and came up to slam the heel of his hand into the unfortunate attacker's chin, knocking them clear back into the crowd. He turned in time to catch the second mech's hands in his own as they attempted to tackle him.

For a moment, they were stuck in a dead lock, hand clasped to hand as they braced their feet against the floor and they shoved back and forth. The audience got over its initial shock at Boomersparks' broken arm and was cheering on the fight wildly like a pack of animals. Most people would feel excited and proud to cause this much excitement, but to Soundwave, it was illogical. The audience would not benefit from either Soundwave or Boomerspark's mechs' winning, why should the audience be so excited?

The other mech, a deep red and green colored, ugly brute, snarled into Soundwave's covered face and shoved him backwards. Soundwave's feet skipped on the floor as they slid back and almost completely lost their footing.

_Perhaps aiding strength can come from the abdominal core?_ Soundwave thought, striking upon a different version of the idea of lifting with one's legs and not one's back.

Soundwave clenched his abdominal area up; causing the cable muscle there to compact into a thick column of strength. At the same time, though, he felt something new there, a sort of buzz. A sharp whistle pierced the air before the air between Soundwave and his opponent rippled like water. It blew the opponent back clear over the club dancers' heads, crashing him into a distant corner somewhere. Soundwave stood tall, rearing his head back in hidden mild surprise.

"Whoa, Soundwave!" Neonsight exclaimed, "I didn't know you had sound manipulation abilities! But then again, that would match your name, wouldn't it?"

"Inform: Was not aware of this power myself before now," Soundwave admitted. "Agreement: Name comment."

"Well, what ever, you're getting a raise for this. Wow, cool moves! But why didn't you use your shoulder cannon?"

"Use of cannon: overkill."

- - - - -

Thus Soundwave found himself a job as club bouncer and DJ when he was not in his own apartment, studying up on potential colleges where he could learn to become a communications computer expert. That particular field of knowledge had few professionals and little competition, so logic said that such a field would be a good place to make money. Soundwave studied on the subject as much as he could; getting a head start on what ever college he would decide to attend.

A few weeks after the Boomerspark incident, Soundwave was helping to clean up the club after hours when a chubby-cheeked dark green and brown mech approached him, suitcase in hand. The mech's crown was shaped like a pyramid, turning the top of his head into a ridiculous pointed shape. Several of the other works snickered as he entered, but this mech appeared to be used to such teasings, as he ignored them and made a bee line for Neonsight. He spoke with Neonsight briefly before the club owner pointed him over to Soundwave. Soundwave was pulling chairs out from under the tables to stack them on top for over night storage.

"Soundwave?" this stranger inquired upon approaching the young mech.

"Affirmative," Soundwave said, turning to the strange mech. "Inquiry: Designation?"

"I am Mulchlash," the mech said, shaking a hand that Soundwave had been raising to scratch his head with. "I am an attorney and will supervisor. Soundwave, I hate to be the one to tell you this, but your father is dead."

"Screwdriver is deceased?" Soundwave asked making a complete sentence in the sadness that arose from loosing the mech he had known for so many years. The sadness was unusual, but necessary: After all, the tragically named mech known as Screwdriver had taught Soundwave all sorts of life lessons, and had been there to help him in the rare times when even logic escaped Soundwave… such as during his awkward Morphing years…

"No, Soundwave," Mulchlash corrected, "Not your foster father. Your _biological_ father is dead and has left everything to you."

- - - - -

A week later, Soundwave called in his vacation days and met Mulchlash at the train station. They took a hyper rail train out of the city and into the wilderness outside of town. As the city buildings shrank and disappeared behind them, turning into the silver metal forests of the excessively rare wilderness of Cybertron, Soundwave stared at a couple of hawk-bots circling in the sky over head. Both were black, with one being accented in yellow and the other in red. To Soundwave, their colors mixed into orange in his optics as his mind spun with the strange circumstances he was in. His father, his biological father, had never spoken to him or contacted him in any sort of way his entire life. And yet, the strange mech had left everything to Soundwave when he had died? Why?

Once the train had stopped, Mulchlash led the way to a waiting hover car and drove Soundwave deeper and deeper into the wilderness, going even off the paved roads and across the battered back ways of the wilderness. After several hours of twisting and turning in the wilderness, they came to a house.

"There you go, Soundwave," Mulchlash sighed as they pulled up in the drive way, "Your biological parents' home."

The home was a humble pale yellow dome set in a large clearing. It appeared well kept, and had not been neglected after its previous owner's death. Mulchlash gave Soundwave a tour of the place as if he were trying to sell it. From the front door, they entered directly into a living room. The two left exits in the living room led to the kitchen and storage area. One doorway in the kitchen's north wall led to the armor cleaning station (the bathroom), and the other led down into the basement. A door in the ceiling could be pulled open with a string to drop down a ladder and take them up to the loft over head, where the private bed quarters, a mini library, and a sort of gaming area were set up. The loft was a peculiar place; it had been painted dark brown and outfitted with golden-tinted lights, adding an almost organic touch to the place. Here, as Soundwave scanned the titles of the hologram texts on the bookshelves, Mulchlash read off the will and Soundwave's right to the land.

"Well, Soundwave, this is your place now," Mulchlash began, reciting his speech from Spark. "According to the file work assembled, signed and left behind by your biological parenting units that were to take place upon their deaths and after their bodies had been disposed of as they had specified, which is being ceremoniously melted down in this case, you own everything they ever owned in their life times. This hut and over fifty square acres of the land around it are yours to do as you wish, whether it be commercial, entertainment, or other purposes. Everything you find on this land, and on this land only, you own. Everything you find on this land or in this hut is yours to do with as you wish, whether it will be to preserve, keep, hide, destroy, or do other wise with these items as long as it corresponds with in the Cybertronian Counsel laws. With this land, you also inherit their bank balance of 78,984. 336 Cybertronian credits, four percent of which is in foreign currency, and you are also entitled to any items they may have stored in any safety deposit box that they may have, of which a charter will be provided for you at a later date upon requesting. Now, sir Soundwave, all you have to do is sign some text work and I will leave you to sort through your new possessions as you wish…"

Soundwave automatically signed the texts, as if in a daze, and sent Mulchlash on his way. Once he was sure that he was alone, he went immediately back to the loft and to the shelves there. Sure enough, he found several hologram journals stored there, all filled with pages upon pages of elegantly scrawled personal writing. Soundwave took these journals over to the gaming area, sitting at the card table there, and began reading well into the night.

It was illogical in every possible way to Soundwave. According to the journals, his father, Frequency, had been very well off and from a good family when he had met a femme known as Iris and Soundwave had been born. There was nothing scandalous in the birth, seeing as how Soundwave's father had been a decently wealthy mercenary and Iris, a town sweet heart. There had been no threats against Soundwave's existence, they had had not been poor, they could have easily hired a care taker to care for Soundwave had they not wanted to themselves, and no other strange or negative conditions surrounded Soundwave's birth. They were perfectly ready to take care of a Sparkling on their own in every possible way.

So why had they abandoned him on a stranger's door step, only to give him everything in their passing? Had Soundwave not been good enough for them? Had they felt too young and irresponsible to care for their son? Had things happened that had not been noted in the journals? There were no answers and now it appeared that there never would be.

But curiosity drove Soundwave on. His logic was unsound, but unrelenting. Hence, he called in on more vacation days and even began taking sick days as he poured over the journals for the next few weeks, drawing parallels between the tales of the mech, Frequency, who had wrote in them and Soundwave's own life. Soundwave almost drove himself crazy imagining what his father and mother had been doing on certain nights of his life. On this day of that month and year, Soundwave had gotten into his first fist fight while his father noted a funny tick in his transforming sequence. On the day Soundwave first sprouted his shoulder cannon, his mother and father had been enjoying a turbo-fox hunt. The parallels went on an on until Soundwave had an entire data bank of parallels.

From these journals, Soundwave had also been able to diagnose that his biological father had been a merry mech, always helping neighbors out and playing pranks and being the life of the party while his biological mother had been a gentle, shy femme that stayed close to her husband. She had been an old-fashioned version of a stay-at-home mother unit who did the house chores and helped her husband as best she could. Soundwave also came to realize that they had had no other relatives other than themselves.

But no answers were presented to Soundwave as to why they had left him behind.

It was only when he went rummaging through the numerous boxes of pictures at the bottom of the shelf, both printed on metal sheets and hologramed, did he realize why they had left him.

His father had been tall and narrow, deep red and white in color with a racer-style helmet and wide mitts for hands and thick trunks for feet. His mother had been a dainty little patch of yellow with extensions like a skirt around her waist and nervous, sparkling blue optics. Neither bore any sort of resemblance to Soundwave.

Soundwave had been an accident between his mother and a strange mech.

It was logical: Almost all of Soundwave's traits were dominant, meaning that they would cover up any trait from his mother. Going back through the journals, he went back to approximately around the time he could have been conceived and born and recognized the angry jabs, the small journal entries of mundane daily details written in turquoise light. When Soundwave had been accidentally made, Frequency had stubbornly attempted to hide his anger, deciding to take it out on the unfortunate Sparkling-to-be by making his obedient, almost-faithful wife leave him in some stranger's care.

After that, the mystery was solved.

Soundwave packed away the personal items and stored them in the basement, keeping out only the barest furniture. For some reason, he did not feel like going home yet. He sat on the front step of the small house in the wilderness, staring out at the metallic trees while he drifted about in a wordless, emotionless mental void. Logic and emotion alike failed to describe what he felt. Finally, as the sun went down, he managed to put logic into the situation and spoke it allowed to the wilderness that had no audio receptors to hear it or the voice to repeat it.

"Illogical: Studying mechs that, by definition, are my parent units, but never were parent units. Illogical: Discovering true father, a mech who did not stay behind to see his offspring. Logical: Abandoning pointless personal mission for answers."

No one heard this declaration, but it satisfied Soundwave.

- - - - -

**Two Years Later**

"Soundwave, I'm hungry!"

"Soundwave, Buzzsaw keeps pecking my head!"

"_Soundwave, Frenzy's hogging all the room!"_

"_Soundwave, I need to fly __now__!!!"_

"_Soundwave; shut these idiots up!"_

With the yelling voices of his humanoid Cassetticons and the animal Cassetticons shouting in his head, Soundwave was on the verge of throwing them all out and showing them how he used his shoulder cannon for the first time ever. Instead he ignored them as he walked into the city, shopping list in hand. Taking care of a band of Cassetticons was trying on one's financial abilities at times, but it was worth it.

Soundwave had always had the full intent of selling his biological parent units' hut and moving on with his life, but he had found that he liked the seclusion. Hence, he had decided to stay on with it. He quite his job as DJ and had taken to living on his parents' initial land. He took up the hobby of hunting the game on the land when he could to stretch the money his parents had left him, and studied all about communications technologies in his spare time.

When he had originally found Ravage and the bird-bots in the wooded land of his inherited property on one hunting trip, he had acted on some sort of instinct and taken them home to care for them. After he had earned their trust, the animals had never left. When they had started nesting in his once-empty chest compartment, an internal calling made had him realize that he was a Cassetticon handler and accepted the responsibility of the talent. That same internal calling made him adopt Frenzy and Rumble when he found them during a night time walk cutting through his land. To him, it was logical to take care of the orphaned Cassetticons and animal-mechs: They could be useful in case Soundwave ever was approached by hostile mechs, and he could learn things from them. In deed, Frenzy and Rumble had already taught him much in the art of combat, even more than what he had known originally. Over time, they had become a family, playfully arguing most of the time, but forgiving each other when serious issues arose.

Now, Soundwave had gathered up all his Cassetticons to go grocery shopping for more energon in the small city near Soundwave's home; the exact same city Laserbeak and Buzzsaw had once hunted in. All over the place, he could see guards standing with weapons in hand, postings about warning against the Decepticon rebels, and people traveling in small, huddled packs like so many fearful pack animals. It was logical: The Decepticons had been gaining notoriety through out Cybertron for their murder sprees. People feared for their lives in case of a sudden attack.

Soundwave was pulled from his thoughts when he felt a violent jerk in his chest as one of the Cassetticons kicked his chest window.

"Soundwave!" the Cassetticons shouted, "Laserbeak needs to use the bathroom!"

Soundwave hastily pressed on his shoulder button numerous teams, making his chest window drop open. Laserbeak burst from his chest compartment and rocketed into the sky with a relieved screech. Following him right on his tail board, the rest of the Cassetticons fell out: Ravage, Buzzsaw, and the brothers, Frenzy and Rumble.

They collapsed in a heap of metal limbs, wings, and paws at Soundwave's feet on the sidewalk, making several people stop and stare before moving on and making Soundwave feel amusement. He knelt and set the Cassetticons apart so that they wouldn't accidentally beat each other up while untangling themselves, as unofficial sibling units tended to do. One of the army guards came away from his post at the corner.

"Excuse me, sir," the army guard said, leaving his large rifle in view in his hands. "Do you have a permit to carry that many Cassetticons?"

"Inquiry: Warrant?" Soundwave asked, standing up.

"New law states that a Cassetticon carrier must register for a proper license and warrant when he or she is carrying three or more Cassetticons," the guard explained.

"We didn't hear nothing about no warrant," Frenzy grumbled.

"So what if we don't have a warrant?" Rumble asked.

"It's if _he_ doesn't have a warrant," the guard said, probing Soundwave's chest with his gun. "If _he_ doesn't have you registered, _you_ go to a pound until the proper text work is achieved."

"Hey, I ain't no pet for no pound!" Frenzy snapped, stomping a foot for emphasis. Ravage snarled and Buzzsaw screeched to agree.

"I'm sorry, but that's just the rules," the guard said carelessly. "It's for everyone's protection in case anyone with three or more Cassetticons is a Decepticon in disguise."

"What if a Decepticon has only one or two Cassetticons?" Frenzy asked.

"Shh, bro, you don't wanna give 'em any ideas," Rumble hissed to him.

"Objection: Cassetticons are Transformers, not pets," Soundwave told the guard. "Pound: Unnecessary. Desire: No complications. Inquiry: Location of warrant and license office."

"Great, a computer mouth," the guard grumbled as he drew a hologram pad from a body compartment and began to scribble directions onto it.

There was a squirt noise and a clear, gooey liquid landed on top of the guard's head. The guard became rigid in horror while Laserbeak landed on Soundwave, sighing in relief. Soundwave turned his head slightly to indicate that he was staring at Laserbeak. Laserbeak noticed everyone staring and bobbed his head in a bird shrug.

"_What?"_ he asked telepathically, _"I had to __go__."_

"_On top of the guard's head?"_ Ravage asked.

"Nice, Laserbeak," Rumble commented, but it was difficult to determine whether it was sarcastic or truly impressed.

The guard mean while, shuddered and growled in frustration, before suddenly throwing the hologram pad and its pen on the ground with a shout. He motioned for some fellow army guards to approach and turned his wrath on Soundwave and his party.

"That's it!" he roared, "All of you, to the pound, _now_! You, computer mouth, _you_ can pick them up tomorrow _if_ you have the proper license and warrants for them!"

The Cassetticons began to protest as four guards surrounded them and Soundwave even began to build a buzzing in his abdomen, preparing for an attack on the guards to protect his new family, the family he had invested in too much to release. The family that he had become the father figure of.

Suddenly, a flash lit the city as a low boom sounded out over head. Everyone looked up and saw streaks of flames diving to the city. The streaks of flames burned out as from them emerged space ships, all branded with a demonic canine-bird insignia.

"Decepticons! Everyone to their stations!" the guard that had been previously harassing Soundwave's squad bellowed.

"Oh man, oh man, oh man," Rumble squeaked happily, dancing from foot to foot eagerly. "A fight, a real fight! Hey, Soundwave, boss, can we fight, can we? Huh? Huh? Can we?"

"Please, Boss, please?" Frenzy begged, "We haven't had a scrap in _so_ long!"

"Yeah, not since we met which was, what, a year ago, now?" Rumble said. "Come on, let's kick some aft!"

Ravage growled in disagreement. Buzzsaw groomed his claws in disinterest while Laserbeak perched motionlessly on Soundwave's shoulder; either bird did not care what would be decided.

"Inquiry: For whom and what we fight," Soundwave asked.

"Let's kill everybody!" Rumble cheered, tossing his hands in the air.

Ravage placed his face against the sidewalk to hide it. Soundwave tilted his head to the side.

"Illogical: Killing everyone. Reason: Too many enemies created to handle. Reasoning: Needed."

"Yeah, yeah, sure, just make it fast before the fight's done," Rumble said.

"Autobots: Wish to impound Ravage, Laserbeak, Buzzsaw, Rumble, and Ravage. Autobots: Enacting laws that seem unfair. Decepticons…"

Soundwave watched as a couple of air-bound Decepticons and Autobots crashed into a building across the street, diminishing it to ruins. The Cassetticons instinctively ducked to avoid the shockwave.

"Decepticons: Strong. Chances of victory in war: High," Soundwave went on. "Proposition: Join Decepticons to avoid capture by Autobots."

"Sounds good to me, as long as we get to fight _something_," Frenzy said, grinning at Rumble. "What do you say, Rumble?"

"I say: Let's get ready to rumble!" Rumble replied as he turned his arms into pile drivers.

Ravage got to his feet and crouched, ready to run into battle; he was ready to fight if Soundwave so commanded it. Buzzsaw looked up at Soundwave. Soundwave nodded to acknowledge the group decision. A group of army soldiers rolled by in alt-form before transforming and attacking a small party of landed Decepticons.

"Cassetticons: Attack!" he shouted, pointing to the battlefield growing around them.

Buzzsaw and Laserbeak burst into the air with a flurry of metal wings. Ravage sprinted ahead of the rest of the party, roaring a war cry as he released all his ancient instincts of combat. Frenzy and Rumble ran ahead of Soundwave, whooping and cheering like maniacs. Frenzy attacked with his sound abilities while Rumble used his small, but powerful pile drivers to literally bring down the metal houses. Soundwave bared his hands and chest as they emitted sonic screeches that made his foes fall in a shout of pain. One soldier ran up to him when Soundwave took a break, but the end of Soundwave's shoulder cannon flashed and the bold foe was destroyed.

The battle was not short, neither it was long. When it was over, the Autobot army had been forced out and the civilians either killed or fled. The Decepticons cheered over their victory and looted the remains of the fighting. Soundwave and his Cassetticons walked among the ruins, drawing Decepticon optics as they went. Finally, a red and white jet-former landed in front of them, pointing a pair of shoulder-mounted null cannons at them. The cannons appeared to have been a recent upgrade.

"Halt!" the jet Transformer snarled, "You don't bear the Decepticon insignia. Who are you?"

"I am Soundwave," Soundwave replied. "Desire: Join the Decepticons."

"What makes you think that you can join my army, Soundwave?" a raspy voice asked.

Soundwave's party, the hostile jet-Former, and the Decepticons standing around them turned and saw Lord Megatron standing near by, burnt and dented from battle, but splattered with the energon of his victims. It was Rumble who answered the question, baring his pile drivers.

"Because we got muscle and skill like no one else!" he whooped.

"That, and the Autobots wanna cage the gang here just because of some _warrant_ or whatever," Frenzy chuckled.

Buzzsaw and Ravage hissed in agreement. Laserbeak's optics flickered strangely. With an unusual twitter, Laserbeak fluttered up and flew over to Megatron. One would think that Megatron would wave away a bird's approach, but instead he raised an arm on which Laserbeak perched on. More than one mech's eye brows rose up in surprise when Megatron stroked Laserbeak's neck, making the bird twitter happily. Apparently, two warrior-Sparked creatures had just made a bond, similar to how warriors of opposing factions acknowledge each others' strength. Megatron moved Laserbeak to his shoulder and looked Soundwave up and down. Soundwave felt no jealousy for Laserbeak's sudden affection for the strange mech: It was odd, but Laserbeak had the right to like who he desired as long as it did not involve harm to Soundwave or the other Cassetticons.

"You are these Cassetticons' handler?" Megatron asked.

"Affirmative," Soundwave answered with a single nod.

"What can you do?" Megatron asked.

Soundwave's shoulder cannon turned around on its own accord and promptly blew apart the remains of a building behind him. Several of the Decepticons jumped and shouted in surprise. The red and white jet-Formers' face fell in disbelief. Rumble and Frenzy smirked at Megatron as they smacked high fives and Ravage purred proudly. Megatron smirked in approval.

"What are your names?" Megatron asked, looking down at the Cassetticons.

"Frenzy!"

"Rumble!"

"Designations: Ravage and Buzzsaw."

"And the war hawk on your shoulder is Laserbeak," Frenzy went on. He patted his shoulder, "That bird and Buzzsaw almost took my neck out the first time we met!"

Laserbeak raised his head and spread his wings slightly, screeching as he shot lasers from his optics and into the sky. He _really_ wanted to make a good impression for Megatron.

"Hmm, I approve," Megatron purred. To the jet-Former that had spoken before, "Starscream, have these mechs properly branded. I look forward to their services."

"Yes, sir," Starscream replied grudgingly.

"Cassetticons: Return," Soundwave ordered.

All the Cassetticons promptly transformed and slid into Soundwave's waiting chest compartment. Laserbeak nuzzled Megatron's fingers one more time before returning to Soundwave and Rumble and Frenzy stuck their glossa out at Starscream before entering Soundwave. Once all the Cassetticons were with in Soundwave once more, he followed the red and white jet-Former away to officially begin his life anew.

**AN: What d' ya think? Originally I wanted the animals all to be city strays, the Cassetticons to be jailed thugs, and Soundwave to just be a mystery whack job in a lunatic ward who busts everyone out all on his lonesome and proceeds to talk the Cassetticons into joining him and hiding in Megatron's ranks, but I like this version better. Yeah, go ahead and run with that jail idea of ya'll want. Reviews, please! And remember: **

**You **_**can**_** request non-Earth origin Transformers. Coming up next, as according to request, we will have Blur, followed by Swindle, then Thundercracker and Skywarp with the origins of the Seeker Squad. Stay tuned!**


	9. Blurr

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and the writer claims no ownership over Transformers. The story is purely for entertainment purposes and does not seek nor approve of any commercial use of this story.**

**Chapter 9**:** Blurr**

Blurr had always liked to go fast. Fast like the wind, fast like a comet, fast like_ light_. Most little bots would have been content to crawl around as a Sparkling, but the instant Blurr had taken his first clumsy sprint across the living room, he had _liked_ the speed and always sought it. He couldn't remember a day where his mother had not spent the day time hours bending over chasing after the little blue bot. His father was a file worker at the local mine that kept their asteroid home town alive, and always found it hilarious how his wife would look away for one second and only to turn around and see Blurr gone.

When Blurr had gotten to pre-school for Sparklings, Blurr had put up _such_ a fuss when ever another Transformer had out run him. He had even gotten into some fights for being beaten in a foot race. Either that or he fought the opponent for poking fun at how his words came out as a bunch of random stutters because he had been unable to master his speech at that point in life. He was scolded for his fights, of course, but tempers were often expectant of a mining town where most of the miners came home complaining about their uncomfortable working conditions and it was rare if anyone made it above low-middle class life styles.

In Elementary school, Blurr had been put in speech class and had learned to speak clearly, hence over coming his language barrier. He still spoke quickly, though, when he was excited, energetic, or upset. As he grew older, his temper cooled, like the blue and white paintjob that appeared when he reached his Morphing years, but it always seemed reflected in the speed horn that he grew on his forehead during the same years.

By the time he graduated to high school, he had cooled off with loving speed so much and had managed to have a normal life. He wasn't determined to race everyone he saw and had learned to speak what he called "slowly" to others so that they could understand him when he needed to be understood. Still, he couldn't help but be impatient with everyone, always wanting to go, go, _go_! At least he got something good out of being such a hyper boy: He had kept fit from constantly sprinting around his small, middle-of-nowhere asteroid-bound town for fun. True, he was often teased for such antics, but all he had to do was sprint circles around them and leave them eating his dust.

Soon enough, though, Blurr took up a job early in order to help support his house hold, as was common for his town's youth.

- - - -

A small bolt flew through the air and clinked against his head. He kept his optics off line, feigning sleep. A second bolt through the air and bounced off his speed horn before clattering to the floor. Again, Blurr ignored it. Suddenly, an entire shower of bolts fell over Blurr, sliding into his armor's crevices and into his slightly open mouth. He sat up, spluttering, spitting, and shaking the bolts out at they rained around him. When the shower subsided, a familiar laughter greeted Blurr, making him look up.

Blurr's sleeping hummock was set in a small room cut into the floor, being just barely large enough for him to stand and turn about in. The floor was littered with the wrappers of spent energon goods, spare bits and pieces of parts, and school supplies. Over head, the ceiling was the entrance to the rest of the small house in which the family lived in. Currently, a rich cerulean blue mech with a silver goatee face extension and face grinned down at Blurr with miss-matched blue and green optics twinkling with mirth. In the middle aged mech's hands was a bucket.

"Morning, sonny!" the middle-aged mech whooped.

"Hi, dad," Blurr replied, brushing some bolts off his shoulders. "What's up?"

"I'm waking you up for your job, kiddo!" Blurr's father said, tossing aside the bucket and offering a hand. "Come on, you don't wanna be late, do you? Or else you'll never be able to pay for Transforming classes!"

"No," Blurr yawned, taking the hand. "No I don't."

Blurr's father, a mech by the name of Slicker, helped his son out of his "room" before kicking a plate of metal over the hole in the floor, thus making it safe for all to walk on again. The house they lived in was very small, with the bed chambers hidden under old, rusting metal plates on the dirt and concrete floor. The surface part of the house was decently sized, at least, with the bed space being below ground: There was a corner reserved for energon foods preparation, another corner outfitted with some lovingly beaten-about furniture for family time, and a separate room for hygienic purposes. In truth, it would be very easy to put the sleeping chambers above ground, but Slicker insisted on keeping them below ground so that they could hide there in case the miners ever revolted and life suddenly became a lot more violent.

Blurr's mother, a busty femme with dark red and light blue metal coloring, was at the kitchen corner of the home, whipping up some energon biscuits. She glanced over her shoulder as she poured a bottle of energon and a box of metal shavings into a bowl and begin to stir.

"Morning, Blurr," Shiva greeted. "Did you sleep well?"

"Sure did," Blurr said. "Isleptlikearock!,yummy,biscuits!You'resuchagoodcook,anddidImentionthatIlovedyou—"

"I did not freshen up your hummock with anything, I know I'm a good cook, yes, you've told me that you love me, but no, you're not allowed to use the car," Shiva replied, plopping thick glowing blobs of purple onto the metal table top.

"Aww,"Blurr whined.

"You can get to work by walking," Shiva said, taking a step back from the table. "You're always running around, you should be there with in a few hours. I can't wait until we get those Transforming classes paid for that way you can get your own alt-form. Stand back, boys."

Shiva's right arm suddenly spun around and transformed into a short, thick gun barrel as her husband and son obediently stepped back. A short, bright jet of flame leaped from her arm and fell on the biscuits. After a minute, she let off the flame and turned her gun back into an arm. The energon globs had puffed up into nicely toasted biscuits, with hard, crunchy exteriors and warm, fluffy interiors. Shiva packed four into a small lunch box while she allowed her husband to snatch away one of the remaining eight. She handed the lunch box to Blurr and swiped the biscuit from her husband's hands as he was about to bite into it, sticking it into Blurr's mouth. Blurr held the biscuit and ate it while Shiva looked him over as worried mothers are apt to do.

"Oh, look at you, my fine little Blurr," Shiva cooed, "All grown up and hansom! Why, I remember when there was a day that you could scarcely cross the floor before tumbling heels-over-processor, and now look! My, what a hansom lad you are!"

She began to rub at a spot on Blurr's head to clean it. Blurr exchanged an unseen look with Slicker and they both rolled their optics. Both knew darn well that Blurr was way too scrawny for a mech of his age, not because of malnourishment (their house was humble, but they were always well energized and happy), but because Blurr always ran off any weight he _did_ gain. Finally, Blurr shrugged off his mother and gave her a hug before heading to the door.

"I'll see you later!" he called.

"Good luck!" Shiva called.

Blurr couldn't help but shake his head and chuckle as he exited the family's tin home. With the way his mother was becoming emotional, one would think that he was going off to college rather than the town scrap yard for his first day of work.

Outside, near-identical tin homes lined the streets of the asteroid town Blurr lived in. With only a thin atmosphere, there was never day or night; just a permanent, bright twilight created by the sun that the asteroid loosely orbited around. Overhead, the stars were obvious in the black sky, clashing against the red-brown dirt of the enormous unnamed asteroid. To Blurr's left, he saw the large hill where the mining operations were, and to his right was the only mountain on the asteroid. The scrap yard was on top of that mountain, and Blurr would need to skedaddle if he wanted to show up at work on time.

Blurr stopped and looked up at the mountain, guessing how much work he was about to do getting up it alone. He looked down at his lunch box and found two tabs that he pulled to bring out the rolled up straps inside. Once he had slung the lunch box onto his back like a backpack, he began at an easy trot up the road that would wind around the mountain. It would have been easier to put the lunch box in a worry-free sub-space compartment, but Blurr's family didn't have that natural ability.

An hour later, with another two to go before he would begin his shift, Blurr was running the last quarter mile to the top of the mountain. He wasn't even fazed by the steep incline and was even smiling a little to himself as he enjoyed the exercise.

At that moment, the noise of a humming hover car broke the lonely silence. Blurr looked behind himself curiously, but did not stop running. The hover car came in sight a moment later: It was a nice, new hover car, pale yellow in color with blue streaks of light straying behind it from its under pads. In the roofless car were several cheerleaders from Blurr's school with their sportsmen boyfriends with the leader driving the hover craft. Blurr couldn't hear them over the sound of the displaced dirt crunching against itself or the loud hum of the new sports vehicle, but judging by the way they pointed and reading their lips, they were making fun of his lack of a car. Blurr smiled and shook his head and ran a little faster, as if he could out run the vehicle.

The hover craft sped on and Blurr settled back into his own easy pace. A few minutes later, he was rounding the second-to-last bend in the road when he heard a crash of metal on metal. He skidded to a halt in shock, then sprinted forward as nervous fear and curiosity swept his Spark. Turning the last bend, he came upon the tall fence made of crude metal boards and beams that surrounded the scrap yard, and the mountains of trash beyond. But what caught his sight first was the hover car and what it had crashed into.

Blurr had heard tales of the enormous mech known as Goliath that lived in the scrap yard, moving scrap here and there and melting it down for processing, but never had he seen the mech himself because his parents had always warned him against going up here. All sorts of boogeyman tales surrounded the enormous mech, claiming that he ate naughty Sparklings, melted down any one he caught, and that he was a slave working on the mountain to prevent him from destroying the town.

Now, the hover car had carelessly crashed into the enormous brown mech's trunk of a leg. The passengers were scattered about in and around the car. Goliath stared down at the teen-bots with large, slow-thinking yellow optics. After a moment, he emitted a low, creaky groan as he knelt and scooped the car up in one hand. Inside, three of the passengers looked up and clutched each other, screaming in terror.

"Oh, slag," Blurr muttered.

One of the teen mechs on the ground saw Blurr and sat up.

"Hey! Zippy!" the teen-mech called. "Help us!"

"Thename'snotZippy,it',whatdoyouexpectmetodo?I',—" Blurr replied.

"Just do something, Zip!" a femme yelled.

"Itoldyou,myname'sBlurr,notZip—"

A femme's scream came from over head and Blurr looked up. The annoyance he had gotten at being called Zippy disappeared when he saw that Goliath had the hover car poised over his open maw while he tilted his head back.

"Ack!Ohnoohno,whatdoIdo?WhatdoIdo?WhatdoIdo??" Blurr exclaimed, running back and forth frantically.

Goliath spotted Blurr and lowered the car, rumbling curiously as he watched the little streak of blue dart back and forth around him. Goliath carelessly tossed the car into a scrap pile, beating it up, but letting the teen-bots live, before he knelt over Blurr. Blurr stopped and looked up as an enormous shadow fell over him. He felt all his systems cough in terror when he saw the enormous hand of Goliath coming down to him.

"Oh, slag," he squeaked.

Blurr's Spark hitched up in terror when he saw the enormous fingers coming down to him, ready to squish him. The teen-bot instinctively turned on a heel, swinging his leg up so that he could start off with a maximum speed boost, and as he ran… something happened.

He felt something in him fall away, or gently break, like a cable rope that had held a spaceship docked for too long and had finally given away. Blurr felt his body jump forward and he thought he saw one of Goliath's Transformer-sized fingers go right through his leg as he left a mere after image of himself. Then he left it behind as the air popped around him several times and he sped off. Behind him, a single puff of dust was left in the air and the giant and teen mechs were left staring at a fading after image of Blurr.

"Well," one of the teen-mechs muttered, "_That_ was unexpected."

Goliath roared and swatted a scrap pile in frustration at loosing his play thing and the teen-mechs were quick to escape the area of the scrap yard before Goliath turned his wrath upon them.

For Blurr, the world became a multi-colored, jittering streak around him. Blurr looked around, still running, with his jaw dropped open in surprise as cool air rushed past him. Suddenly, a massive object flew by just overhead, making Blurr shout in surprise as he dropped down to slow down. He came down to slide to a stop in an extended-leg, sideways stop, like a player sliding in to the home plate. He slipped and tumbled as he fell over a sudden, unseen drop, sending his heels over his head, before crashing up against a hard surface upside down with his back to the surface. He groaned and rubbed his stiff face, his body warm and smoking from friction. He heard people around him and opened his optics to see a crowd passing by in front of him.

"Huh?" he asked, sitting up. "Didtheminecollapse?Isthere somethinggoingon?Whatwhatwhatwhat?"

But he was no longer on his home asteroid's small mining town; he was in a huge city with towering glass and metal buildings with crowds of Transformers crossing through them. He looked around, his optics widening in surprise. Up in the sky in the far off distance, he spotted a slow-cruising city transportation hover craft, the same he had been forced to duck from. In the far off distance in front of him, Blurr spotted an enormous cliff, indicating that the city was in a natural sink hole. Blurr must have fallen off of that when he tumbled. But that distance! Could he surly tumble that far a distance in such a short time? And where was he, anyhow?

A trio of avian Transformers flew by and Blurr watched their path, flying over the roof of the building Blurr had crashed into. An enormous red face insignia stamped on the side of the building marked it as the Cybertronian Leadership Headquarters; where all the leaders of Cybertron met for political business. But that was on Cybertron, and Blurr's home town was on an asteroid in the galaxy's outer orbit! So that meant… he was on _Cybertron??_

"Holyslag!" he shouted, clapping his fists to his head. "I _ran_ here!"

He looked around, putting his hands down, scanning the crowd for anyone who looked like they might help.

"IgottaamakesurethatI'monCybertronandIdidn'," he muttered.

Suddenly, he spotted a promising mech: He was a middle-aged adult, tall, barrel-chested, and broad-shouldered. His primary color was a perfect blue, with silver accents. He was standing beside a street food cart, buying himself some energon snacks to enjoy in the cheery sunlight. Blurr wasn't sure if it was the mech's paintjob (which matched Blurr's own blue, light blue, and white colors), or just the friendly way he chatted with the street cart vendor, but Blurr decided that he looked like he could help.

The confused teen-bot took a few quick steps forward, but once more the air blurred around him and he stopped short. He waved his arms wildly to regain balance upon his sudden stop, then spun around and was dismayed to see that he had gone three clear city blocks passed the mech. Growling in frustration, he walked back, and still managed to get to the cart with his target with in a minute.

"Excuse me, sir?" Blurr asked the older blue mech curiously.

The older mech turned and Blurr's energon processor hit his feet when he saw the winged red-faced insignia on the mech's chest. He was talking to a Prime. Well, slag, suddenly it didn't feel like such a big deal to find his location if it meant talking to one of Cybertron's _elite generals._

"Yes, young lad, what is it?" the Prime inquired.

_No going back now,_ Blurr thought.

"Where am I?" Blurr asked curiously.

The street vendor and the Prime exchanged amused smiled before the Prime looked back at Blurr and replied, "Why, you're in Cyberopolis, the capital of Cybertron!"

Imagine the vendor's and Prime's confusion when Blurr panicked at this! Blurr yelled in surprise, and began pacing back and forth rapidly, leaving a smoking, darkening trail in the pavement as he quickly spoke to himself as he thought aloud.

"!HowdoIgetoutofthis?,anyhow?,maybeIgotsuperspeedfromthat?Now,somehowI',butphysicallyimpossibleaswell,, _faster than the speed of light _.Hmm,Iwonder…"

The Prime, meanwhile, slowly closed his shutters over his optics in confusion while the vendor took his cart and slowly shuffled away. The Prime jumped in surprise when Blurr suddenly bolted forward. To the Prime, it looked like Blurr had frozen in mid-leap. Curiously, he waved a hand to Blurr, only to see it go right through the fading after image. Blurr disappeared, only to reappear on the other edge of town. He stopped short on the western cliff lip over looking the city. He stopped, waving his arms to regain his balance, and spun around on one heel to look back at the city.

"Cool!" he cheered. "I _do _have super speed!"

He bolted back the way he had come. The Prime was examining the black streak Blurr had paced into the pavement and looked up, only to see a flicker of blue in the air before Blurr crashed into him. Both clashed into the ground in a heap of clattering metal and pained grunts.

"Oops," Blurr apologized, quickly leaping to his feet, "Sorry,sir,IjustseemtohavefoundthatIhave superspeedandI'mafraidthatIcan'tcontrolittoowellyet."

"What--?" The older mech asked, rubbing the side of his head where he had hit it.

"?

,andmydad,too!Mydadisjustgoingto_love_this."

"Huh?"

"Communicator," Blurr stated, holding out a hand.

Understanding, the Prime took a round device from a storage compartment at his belt and held it out.

"Oh, yeah, sure, kid, here you—"

"ThanksI'llmakethisquick," Blurr said, snatching away the communicator device.

A quick few button jabs had the borrowed communicator calling a femme mother a long, long way away from Blurr. Blurr tapped his foot a couple hundred times in rapid fashion in inpatients as he waited through three rings for his mom to call. The Prime noticed this and stared at Blurr oddly as it began to sink into him that Blurr was not normal. Alright, yet, it might have been obvious enough with the burn in the pavement and the afterimage, but this Prime had met stranger and sometimes it was hard to tell.

_"Hello?"_ a familiar female voice asked on the other end of the communicator.

"Mom, I ran to Cybertron!" Blurr exploded into the communicator.

_"WHAT!?"_ Shiva exclaimed.

_"What's the matter, honey?"_ Slicker called in the background.

_"Blurr says he's on Cybertron!"_

_"How'd he get there?"_

_"He said he ran!"_

_"What??"_ Slicker exclaimed.

"Yeah!" Blurr yipped.

_"What?"_ his parents asked.

"What?" the Prime echoed.

Blurr told his mother about how he had saved the teen-mechs from the scrap yard giant and the extraordinary thing that happened when he had ran away. He was forced to repeat it several times until he had controlled himself enough to speak in a normal pace of voice. All the while, the Prime stood right behind him, listening to as many words as he could that rushed out of the teen-bot's mouth.

_"Oh my Primus,"_ Shiva replied in disbelief, _"I __can not__ believe this…"_

_"Well, I can!"_ Slicker laughed._ "I __told__ you that I had a great uncle, twice removed, from the second cousin that could turn into a space jet, didn't I? He could hyper jump from one end of the universe to the other and now my boy can, too!"_

_"Primus above helps us,"_ Shiva groaned.

"Pardon me, may I speak to your mother?" the Prime suddenly asked.

Blurr looked at the robot oddly, but he spotted the Prime insignia, and nodded as he handed the communicator back over.

"Hello is this Blurr's mother unit?" the Prime asked. "Hi, I'm Fro-Zone Prime, the mech whose communicator your son is borrowing. He, literally, ran into me and, well, frankly, ma'am, I'm curious; has your son ever considered the military?"

- - - -

And that was how it began.

Blurr's action-loving father agreed and was proud that his one and only son would be able to have a better life than one as a miner. Also, Slicker just wanted an excuse to try hijacking a Cybertronian war tank. Blurr's mother was shy about it, but she gave consent for her son to be recruited by the Cybertron army early, hoping that they'd be able to harness Blurr's new-found super speed for good. And, indeed, they used it.

After training him to properly control himself at such speeds they set him as a messenger bot for information too special to put through common communicators and computers. When Blurr wasn't on an assignment, it became a joke between him and his fellow army friends to make bets as to how fast it would take him to run from one place to the other. His personal favorite record that he was able to run from one certain base to the other, with each base being at the literal opposite ends of the solar system in five seconds flat… and that was with _distractions_.

Blurr loved his job because he was able to go as fast as he wanted and no one teased him for it. Unlike back in school, when people would ask him sarcastic questions like where the fire was or who was he running from, in the military, people just accepted that he needed to run fast and left it at that; similar to how people seemed to accept that kids in high school always simply accepted that jocks had to shove nerds into lockers.

Certain changes came over the little bot. Through several sessions of boot camp, Blurr grew into some muscle, making him seem less delicate. His speed horn on his head snapped off during a particularly dangerous mission with some hostile rouge Transformers, and had been reattached lower and sharper on his head. He also learned how to control his speed so that he wouldn't go sliding about all over the place when he stopped or turned, or put things on fire with friction. That last one proved to be a particular, shall we say, _entertaining_ issue to fix.

Of course, there were times when the light blue and white robot had difficulty with the military's strict code of conduct; he had only been a teen-bot, after all, and teen-bots tend to do stupid things. But usually Fro-Zone Prime would rescue Blurr from such situations, often teaching him a lesson, and things would be okay. Fro-Zone became a welcoming father figure to Blurr, where Blurr's own father had lacked seriousness and discipline. Fro-Zone and Blurr fought a few times, of course, but that only made their bond stronger.

Blurr never expected for anything more to happen. He thought that he would just keep running messages and packages until he got too old to run fast any more. After all, everyone was content, politics and the economy was stable, and things were just generally either positive or neutral. What more could any one want? What reason could anyone find to fight?

That all changed, of course, the day the Decepticons attacked…

- - - -

Blurr, for once in his short life, was frozen with fear.

The entire front of the council building had been blown up in a bomb and now Autobots and Decepticons were battling one another. The Transformer, standing just with in the bounds of adulthood, stared in shock was mechs he had come to know as friends be flung down by their larger enemies and have their processors dashed across the smoking ruins of the building walls. Energon squirted and flowed freely and metal screeched and crashed together violently with in the raging storm of combat. Never had Blurr seen such carnage in all his years of military service. Never had he _wanted_ to see such carnage. But now that he saw it, he didn't know what to do.

Suddenly, a large hand seized his arm and he turned to see Fro-Zone Prime by him. Prime's other arm was in its gun alt-form; a long nozzle with a white tip that spewed a freezing substance, hence his name. But something had crushed the nozzle, making it dribble chunky white foam that cast up a freezing mist in the laser-heated air and formed a thin coating of ice where ever it fell, and a mass of wires was coming from his shoulder. But the fire in Fro-Zone Prime's optics clearly declared that he was not going to back down. Seeing that he had Blurr's attention, Fro-Zone took his hand off of Blurr, reached into a compartment in his chest, and pulled out a data pad that he shoved into Blurr's arm.

"Blurr," he said, "This is all the building's data. The original data has been deleted, so this is the Autobots' only frame of Intel at the moment and without it there _are no Autobots_. Listen to me and listen to me carefully; this is the real deal now, kid, so no more fooling; this isn't some gang or hefty organic pirate crew or even a possible rouge agent you're dealing with, but a real army of slaggers who really want to kill you, even if you have nothing to deal with them. Your job is _real_, it is _important_, and your mission is to get this data pad to Base XY-ZR in Sector 47 on the double, _no matter what, _do you understand?"

"DeliverpackagetoBaseXY-ZR,Sector47,rRojer,sir!I' bethinkingit'sherewhenit'sactuallythereandI'" Blurr declared, taking the data pad and saluting.

"Alright, alright, get going already!" Fro-Zone laughed.

Blurr looked around at the chaotic battle going on around him self nervously. The young adult robot was worried about being hit by a stray laser shot, but he had a mission to do… his first _real_ mission. Taking a deep breath, he looked one last time at Fro-Zone Prime and nodded. Apart of him was still clinging to the idea that maybe, _just maybe_, that things would turn out alright as soon as he finished his mission. But in spite of this feeling, his next words were that of a classic line that shows that the speaker clearly knows that they will never see their comrade again.

"It was a pleasure knowing you, sir," he said.

Fro-Zone Prime nodded and smiled sadly. Gathering up his courage, Blurr spun around and bolted out of the battlefield as fast as he could, causing the air behind him to emit a short screech-boom of a broken sound barrier. One or two unlucky Decepticons were knocked clear off their feet in the wake of his path, but he did not stop, going at an all out sprint.

He was at the cliff edge outside of the city when he heard an explosion and spun around. Below him, under the starry night sky, the city glimmered and sparkled like a glowing, gemmed organism. But in the center of it all, where the political buildings were, Blurr saw a huge fireball sprouting from the building as someone's explosive charge went off.

- - - -

"_The attack on the Political Ruling Building of Cyberopolis as been an atrocious act of violence on these rebels' behalf,"_ the Ultra Magnus was saying on the radio. _"We've lost many friends today, but I assure you that these vagabonds will pay for their crimes…"_

Blurr sat on a wall bench in the main gathering hall of Base XY-ZR. Autobots crowded the hall, gathering around the radio to listen to the Magnus' speech about the rebels' attack as quietly as they could. But while the Autobot soldiers' optics were filled with awe, fear, surprise, and excitement, Blurr's own optics were merely dim with sadness.

He had called time and time again in the hours following the attack, and even when the chaos had become order, no one could find Fro-Zone Prime. It was only when one clueless unlucky clean-up soldier walked by with a sooty, disembodied arm in the form of a long nozzle with a white tip did Blurr realize that his mentor, the mech who had been a friend, a teacher, and a father to him, had died.

Blurr closed his optics and lowered his head, rubbing his hands across the speedy spike on his head, as if rubbing the growing ache there could fix the ache in his Spark.

Not only had Fro-Zone Prime perished in the attack, but many of Blurr's friends, as well; interns, fellow foot soldiers and messengers; all of whom were merely mechs doing their jobs until the rebels had come in and shot them dead. All of them had never wanted to fight, had never wanted to battle, had never wanted conflict had been brutally murdered by the Decepticon rebels. He shuddered at the last thought, suppressing energy that wanted to manifest itself as a screaming rage of vengeance and anguish.

"Autobot Blurr?"

Blurr's head snapped up and saw that only one mech other than him didn't have their optics trained on the radio. The mech was red and orchid in color with a long, silvery extension on his face referred to as a "mustache". Blurr's optics widened as he sat up straight in surprise. He had known that this mech lived in Cyberopolis, of course, but had never met him face-to-face before.

"The communications system between Autobots is down and the Primes need to know each others' situation," Alpha Trion said. "Are you up for a long night of running?"

Blurr wanted to say no, and to curl up and die to join Fro-Zone. An ache was growing in his processor and his Spark was zapping about in its Chamber, making his chest area hot and ached like it had a rash, all symptoms of stress. But this was what Fro-Zone Prime had been training him for: Long, hard, fast running all over the galaxy to deliver news that could not be otherwise given.

Steeling himself for the most challenging mission yet, he stood and saluted.

Nodding, Blurr simply replied, "Of course, where do I start?"

**AN: Any non-Earth origin Transformers can be requested to make their own appearance in the story. If their origin wasn't fully revealed in the original G1 Transformers cartoon, feel free to request them.**


	10. Swindle

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and the writer claims no ownership over Transformers. The story is purely for entertainment purposes and does not seek nor approve of any commercial use of this story.**

**Chapter 10: Swindle**

Honestly, how hard could it be to sell one little space cruiser?

"As you can see, with only 250 credits a month with a single down payment of 500 credits, this lovely item is _very_ affordable to _anyone_," the salesman told the couple. "With its sporty size and cozy space, it can slide into _any_ space in your garage. It comes with a full set of landing struts and jets, plenty of storage space, and even your own energon storage unit!"

"It has rust," the male half of the couple grunted.

"That's just a little dirt," Swindle assured, brushing away some of the large brown splotches that covered the space cruiser.

"It has cracks in the window," the female half of the couple pointed out.

"That says that you're a daring, adventurous couple!"

"The nose is dented."

"Makes it that much smaller and easier to store in your garage!"

"The left wing tip is gone."

"A little bonding substance from the office supplies drawer will fix that right up!"

"It's leaking something."

"That's just water from when we washed it."

"Then why does it still have dirt on it?"

"One of the interns took it out for a test flight."

"The 'water' is black."

"Damn, ah ha, I mean, darn, I thought I told that kid no drinking in the merchandise!"

"It's on fire."

The black, purple, and golden yellow salesman froze, his purple optics twitching as he struggled to keep his cheerful grin on for his customers, the first two he had had in the entire asteroid-based sales lot the entire day. Slowly, he turned around and sure enough, he could see flickering orange flames in the cock pit of the old, broken down cruiser he was trying to sell. He looked back at his customers and laughed nervously.

"Eh heh, dang kids must be practicing… something… again…" he said weakly.

The Transformer couple shook their heads and turned around, turning into their hover car alt-forms before driving off the lot. Swindle's shoulders and head sunk as he shook his head and sighed sadly. He heard a loud pop and bang as something in the craft behind him burst under the heat of the flames and he raised his head as he turned towards the space cruiser lot's main building.

"Extinguisher in corner four!" he called.

- - - -

A little while later, the fire had been put out by several little automated drones, but the broken down cruiser was now covered in white anti-fire foam. Salesman Swindle sat on the hood of a Transformer car with the sales lot owner sitting beside him. The sales lot owner was an ancient mech by the name of Frengix; a mech who claimed to have been an original Transformer in the very first war against the Quinstons for freedom. For Swindle, though, Frengix's intelligence severely counteracted that idea.

"I just don't see why they didn't like it," Frengix said, shaking his square, rusting yellow head. "Everyone used to _love_ Starburst Wing-X's! The fastest things in the sky, they were; so fast, you could get from one of the solar system to the other with in the hour!"

Swindle groaned as he lied back on the hood of the car and covered his optics in despair.

"Frengix," Swindle groaned, "No one has flown a Starburst Wing-X in over _seven hundred years_ because its descendent, the Exclusive Starburst Screech Wing XIIV can go from one end of the solar system to the other with in _seven sub-micro-seconds!!!_"

"Can it now?"

Swindle groaned and shook his head as he sat up, knowing very well that he would only enter into a long, dull conversation about the past unless he saved himself.

"Look, when is the next mech coming in for his shift?"

"Not until, ooh, I'd say about another four hours," Frengix replied.

Something in Swindle squeaked and ticked loudly as he gritted his teeth plates in an urge to wail aloud in despair.

"H-How about I run that scrap truck down to the yard, huh? It's-it's been getting full."

"Sure, kiddo, and maybe we can enjoy a bottle of Prima-Villa Energon when you get back!" Frengix said cheerfully.

Swindle was walking away at "sure", and was almost to the other side of the lot when Frengix finished his sentence. Swindle muttered to himself as he stepped up into the large cargo-hauling vehicle attached to a bin trailer of enormous hover-cars and space cruisers too old and trashed to be sold to any place except the scrap yard. He started up the cargo hauler with a low, cranky sputter of engine parts wet with oil.

"Prima-Villa Energon hasn't been made in sixteen thousand years because Klesopotassium, the main mineral in its making, went dry after a case of the Rust Plague," Swindle muttered. "And why the heck can't he hire a guy with a cargo-hauling vehicle alt-mode to save me the embarrassment of driving this thing? It's as old as Alpha Trion!"

He steered out of the lot, carelessly crushing one of the extinguisher drones under one of the two wheels the old cargo hauler had to help it steer on his way out. He didn't care for it; Frengix loved fixing those annoying little things as much as he liked making them, which made them seem to multiply like energon-bunnies during a solar flare.

Driving out of the lot, he came to the one road winding around the only mountain the large asteroid had. On top of this mountain was his destination: the unnamed asteroid town's only scrap yard. Below him was the town itself; a collection of around one hundred small tin buildings occupied by the town miners and their families, as well as the usual school, repair shop, supplies shop, etcetera. Across the valley the town was settled in was a large hill pock marketed with black hole entrances to the mines and scarred with silver tracks for the carts in which metals and energon could be led out on.

As he drove up the worn-smooth rock road, he spotted a group of young mechs strutting down a side street and approached a smaller mech. Swindle saw one of them pull a weapon of some sort and the victim turn to flee. He looked away respectively. Those thugs, he knew, had been the same crew terrorizing the streets for years. He knew them enough to know that he didn't want to even _see_ what they were doing in the name of self preservation. The reason for his optic aversion was simple: If he didn't see anything, he didn't know anything for questioning mechs later. At least, he didn't know anything until a little something was in it for _him_.

The drive to the top of the mountain, while long, was quiet and uneventful. Swindle kept himself busy as he crunched and calculated numbers in his processor. The numbers never fully formed in his actual thoughts, but were processed before he could muddle his head with them.

_If I earn that much an hour, but got that much for bonuses in sales,_ Swindle thought, _And had to subtract that much in my minimal living conditions—drat, still not enough!_

"Dang it, Swindle," he growled to himself. "You just _had_ to buy the wrong ticket and blow all your money coming to the _wrong damn asteroid_! Could someone have checked it with you before you flew off? _Nooo_, because they were so damn desperate to get their one measly customer all the way to this middle of nowhere _Pit_ stop that they totally blew off the idea that he wanted to go to someplace _better_ and…"

Of course, Swindle was just ventilating his frustrations for a problem he caused all by his lonesome.

Three years ago, Swindle had been a sales man for a far classier spaceship sales lot than the one he currently worked at on Cybertron. The job had been cushiony, he had gotten by nicely, and as a regular mech, he was fine, as long as he had a bargain to flex his charming skills on, whether it was a sales raise or a pretty femme.

One day, though, the civil war between Autobots and Decepticons started and Swindle's small city was infiltrated with crafty members of Lord Megatron's army who wanted to take the city down from the inside-out, rather than blow it up. Swindle's part was simple: He accepted what ever these crafty mechs gave him and he would politely look away as the Decepticons took away the best space cruisers and stole energon. Swindle found it remarkably easy and it did not take him long to start bargaining. Sometimes, when his morality complained, he would argue to himself that by bargaining with the Decepticons, he was slowing their efforts down just the littlest bit to protect his city. Make deals, not war, right?

Of course, all good things come to an end eventually and one night an Autobot spy among the Decepticons busted Swindle and several of his customers during a large auction for weapons Swindle had "obtained". In the fight that followed, Swindle grabbed what credits he had already collected and bought a ticket for the first shuttle off the planet. He _had_ intended on going to a far-off dead planet rich in minerals where it was rumored that the Decepticons were permanently settling, but he had actually bought a ticket to this middle-of-nowhere mining asteroid. On top of the mix up in shuttles, the shuttles _off_ planet were ridiculously high priced and not even Swindle could talk the prices down.

In short, Swindle was stuck on a nameless mining planet, hiding from the law, dirt poor, and with not even enough business opportunities to help him out.

The grumbling black market dealer-on-the-run was pulled from his thoughts when the old radio attached to the dash clicked to life, emitting a click-filled cloud of white noise before Frengix's voice finally came through.

"_Swindle, Swindle, are you there, Swindle? Swindle? Hello, is this thing on—"_

Swindle rolled his optics and shook his head, taking one hand off the steering wheel to smack it to his forehead before snatching up the microphone to the radio.

"Yeah, I'm here. What's up, Frengix?"

A moment of silence, then another cloud of static as Frengix replied, _"There are some police officers from Cybertron that want to talk to you. Uh, where are you?"_

Swindle's Spark froze.

Cops, oh slag, the cops had found him. But Swindle had dealt with more than one officer in his black market dealing and knew what to do.

"I'm heading up to the scrap yard to dump off a load of scrap," Swindle responded. "How about you send them on up there?"

"_Uh, no chance, Swindle, sorry,"_ Frengix replied, making fear introduce itself to Swindle. _"They're being mighty insistent that __you__ come to __them__."_

Swindle swallowed, erasing any lump there, and replied coolly, "Sure thing, Frengix, I'll just dump this load of scrap off and come on back there, ASAP."

Swindle dropped the microphone and turned the radio off quickly before clutching the steering wheel. His sharp mind was already racing to figure out how he was going to shake the police.

"I'll make them come to me in the scrap yard," he decided aloud after a quick bout of thinking. "Not too many witnesses there, other than the guy who runs the place, the giant, and the occasional hobo, so there'll be no witnesses worth listening to there. I'll either get to bribe them off, or I'll push them into the smelter. Yeah, that's what I'll do: Bribe and live, or kill and run."

Finally, he came around another turn and came to the top of the mountain where the scrap yard was.

Swindle couldn't help but shiver upon seeing the tall metal fencing and the piles of rusting trash beyond. Even though every bit of those piles was just the remains of some old space cruiser or cargo hauler or hover craft, Swindle only had to remember his own transformation sequence and his imagination would run wild. Where these machines _really_ just tools, or were there a couple of true Transformers mixed in amongst these rusting husks? What made these tools so different from Transformers: Their muteness, their lack of self-control, what?

Swindle was shaken from his thoughts when an enormous foot fell to the dirt in front of him, making him slam on the cargo hauler's brakes. He leaned out the window and looked up, up, up, at the owner of the foot.

"Hey, Goliath!" he called up nervously, "How goes it with the work?"

The enormous, oil-covered brown Transformer let out a long, low rumble before transforming. With a long, loud series of scraping metal and flinch-inducing bangs, Goliath had turned into his electro-magnetic crane alt-form. The crane went to work, drifting his large round magnetic on its cable over a pile of trash and sucking it up with the power of magnetic fields. The crane lifted the loaded magnet up and swung around, dumping it into an enormous bin elsewhere. Swindle and everyone else in the mining town knew to stay polite and to not make any sudden moves around Goliath. He was the biggest Transformer anyone had ever seen, and was not too bright. All Goliath had to do was to load up the smelter bin of the scrap yard and, frankly, no one wanted him to do anything more. With his size and strength, it would be a holy terror to have him unleashed upon the town.

Swindle stared up at the electro-magnet as it dropped its scrap into the waiting bin, then swung back around to pick up another pile. He made a swallowing motion in his throat; good Primus, if he got caught in that magnet and was crushed under all that metal…

"Say, Goliath, how about we start up an operation, you and me?" Swindle asked. "I'll see if I can make anything out of the scrap you process, sell it, and give you fifteen percent of the prophets, what d' ya say?"

_But hopefully, a bunch of that scrap will just be the guys I can't bribe,_ Swindle added mutely.

Goliath hesitated, but not to answer Swindle's proposal. Instead, he jerked to a stop as gears clanked and growled as they backfired in him, making him jerk and groan for a minute before he moved again. Goliath was big, old, and, apparently, not in the mood for business operations.

_Well, it was worth a shot,_ Swindle thought miserably.

Distant sirens started and Swindle glanced over his shoulder at the entrance to the scrap yard, seeking the tell-tale glow of yellow and white police lights.

"Well, Goliath," Swindle called loudly up to the giant, "I'm just going to drop this off at your boss's place, so please don't kill me."

Goliath made no motion to acknowledge Swindle's existence. Swindle debated briefly whether or not it would be smart to drive on past Goliath, or wait until the giant was done with his work. But the cargo hauler stank like a poisonous mold of oil and other engine fluids, not to mention the sickly sweet, disgusting smell of past drivers' paints and fumes staining the inside of the cargo hauler with their scent. Swindle was _not_ going to wait for who-knew how long until Goliath was done, only to get caught by the police. Besides, the scrap yard owner, a mech as old and nameless as time itself, would have his hide if he found Swindle idling in the scrap yard.

Putting the cargo hauler back into drive, Swindle drove the wheeled-hover craft hybrid antique forward, coming in front of Goliath. He was almost past the monstrous machine when suddenly; the cargo hauler stopped moving forward and actually went _back_ before being _lifted off the ground_.

"Slag!" Swindle yelled, turning to open the door. But the door merely thunked in its lock. Swindle pawed at the lock and tried opening it again, but was dismayed to find that it was stuck down.

The cargo-hauler jerked as it became attached to the underside of Goliath's enormous magnet, along with several other husks of broken down machines.

"No!" Swindle yelled as Goliath swung him over to the bin. "Of _all_ the times that the stupid door _jams_—"

Noticing his predicament, Swindle began to roll the driver's window down, deciding to squeeze through it and escape. Looking around, he could see the entire scrap yard from his current position. The roof of the cargo hauler was stuck to the bottom of Goliath's magnet, and around Swindle were several more rusted and useless space cruisers waiting for their turn in the smelter. Looking down, Swindle's Spark zapped in its Chamber when he saw the bin directly below him. The enormous bin was lined with glowing red-hot panels whose sole goal was to soften up the metals dropped into them in preparation for the smelter.

A stick of scrap metal spun around in the breeze and fell from its vehicle, twirling in the air before clattering into the bin far below. It clunked as it landed, bouncing on one end before falling on its side. After a moment, it just melted away into a pool.

Swindle gulped and yanked a little too hard on the knob he was turning to roll down the window, snapping it off. He looked at the knob before looking skyward.

"Curse you, Frengix, and your damn antiques!" he screamed.

The magnet suddenly jerked, making Swindle drop the knob and place his hands on the dashboard in an attempt to keep him self from bouncing out of his seat. Down below him, he saw three police cruisers, yellow and white in color, enter the scrap yard, led by a cruiser with the more-modern black and white color scheme. The yellow-white cruisers were of the asteroid town's police force while the black-white one was most likely from Cybertron.

"Oh, slag," he squeaked.

The magnet shook again as Goliath let out a long, high metal creak. The creak resembled the noise deep-sea exploration submarines made when they were readjusting the weight placement on their supports. The police mechs below transformed and pointed up at Swindle, exchanging words inaudible from this height.

Cussing to himself, Swindle punched at the glass, knocking the rest of the window out. He crawled halfway out the window, hoping that he could make a jump from the cargo hauler to the ground below. From there, it was a play of words to keep the police from hauling him away in cuffs.

Instead, he got caught up in the magnet and found himself plastered, sprawled-eagle style, with his face and the rest of his front stuck to the electro-magnet. He swore that he heard one of the mechs below snicker.

"Curse you, Goliath, and your damn magnet," he muttered.

Goliath let out another metal creak and there was a loud sound of releasing gears before the pull released itself from Swindle, dropping him and the rest of the scrap.

Swindle screamed aloud, waving his arms desperately in the air as he and the scrap fell.

Swindle's scream was cut off as he came upon the edge of the bin. He hit the bin edge hard, denting his back armor before bouncing off of it and doing a complete back flip onto the safe dirt ground below and doing a face plant, hurt, but out of the bin and alive. He groaned at he slowly sat up, rubbed the fresh flat spot in his head from where he had struck it. Over head, Goliath swung his magnet back around to pick up another magnet-full of scrap, being completely unaware of the little mech he had just almost killed. Swindle sighed and shook his head.

"Curse me and my stupid, stupid ideas," Swindle muttered, shaking his head slowly.

He forced himself to his feet, grunting at the stiff pain that squeezed his lower back. He ran a hand gingerly across it and was dismayed to find that he had left a rather large nasty scrape and dent on his back that prevented him from standing straight. He heard approaching feet and looked up to see the police surrounding him.

"Freeze, put your servos over your head where we can see them!" one of the yellow and white mechs snarled, aiming a gun at him.

Swindle shoved his pain aside and instead emitted his charming smile as he complied.

"Gentlemen," Swindle chuckled. "Are the guns really necessary?"

"I'm afraid so, Swindle," the black and white mech apologized. "You are under arrest for black market dealing, selling of weapons without a license, aiding in the trafficking, theft, and murderous activities of terrorists to the Cybertron Counsel, assisting the Decepticons in their war effort…"

"Hold on," Swindle interrupted. "Before we go one with that rather long list of misunderstandings, how about we make a deal, hmm? I'm about to start up a rather useful operation here in the scrap yard, and I'll be able to pay each of you ten percent of the prophets. What do you say?"

He didn't wonder whether or not the police saw the lie in his wide, friendly grin and innocent purple optics; he was too good to reveal anything from his face. The question was whether or not they were in a bartering mood.

"We say _no_, Swindle," the black and white mech said sternly.

"Fifteen percent," Swindle suggested.

The black-white mech reached for a hand-held device at his side. Swindle saw the bluish-white tab glowing on the larger end of the device and felt the worse fear yet enter his Spark.

_Slag, the personality chip extractor?_ He thought. _I knew I was running with some big mechs… but not __that__ big!!_

"Twenty?" he went on.

The black-white police officer Transformer pressed a few buttons and aimed it at Swindle as it hummed to life.

"Thirty? Forty? Fifty? For the love of Primus, mechs, I was just running a business!"

"We know," the black and white officer said. "But the merchandise you were selling was death."

With that dramatic statement said, the officer pressed the release button.

Swindle tried to move, but had only lowered his arms when the tab ejected from the main device, being attached only by a thin, but strong cord of wire. The tab pierced Swindle's head and grabbed on to an important chip deep with in. The tab numbed the chip with a harmless electric shock that detached it from the rest of the body. The tab retreated back to the police-Former with the chip safely held in its grip. Swindle's body, on the other hand, crumbled to the ground.

"What did you do?" one of the asteroid police mechs asked.

"I've only extracted his personality component," the black-white officer replied. "He'll be fine, and he'll even get his body back after a few millennium in a detention center—"

Goliath's enormous magnet passed by over head again and sucked up Swindle's body as it passed. Before the police could act, the giant dropped the shell into the bin. The police mechs quickly scrambled up the sides of the bin and peeked in just in time to see Swindle's body disappearing in a puddle of gold and purple.

"… Or not," the black-white officer squeaked.

Had Swindle had the optics, audio sensors, or even the conscious to comprehend what had just happened to his body, he would have groaned aloud in despair and probably given up on life then. But fortunately for him, the very detention center his personality component would be stored in would eventually come into Decepticon rule. Many, many, many eons after that, he would re-awaken in a fresh body to be in the services of a certain red and white Seeker.

**AN: Feel free to request non-Earth origin Transformers. I don't wanna miss any of them!**


	11. Thundercracker and Skywarp

**Disclaimer: Transformers is rightful property of Hasbro and not the author of this fiction, which was brought to you for entertainment and no commercial purposes.**

**Chapter 11: Thundercracker, Skywarp**

Starscream had forgotten them for now, and Skyfire was in no state to remember, but there had been two identical-looking jet-Formers in very different dispositions that had been forgotten so long ago back in Skyfire's home.

Thundercracker had grown up in a rough home; his father was either a mean drunk or a sad, sober, broken mech who taught Thundercracker about things like honor and decency, the very same things he cursed and broke apart whilst drunk. His mother had usually been out of the house living with her mother or a friend, leaving Thundercracker in the care of his unstable father. Fortunately for Thundercracker, he had found a mech that had cheered him up enough to keep him from loosing his mind: Skywarp.

The purple and black teleporting jet Transformer was a self-proclaimed orphan or an adventurous run away, depending on what mood he had been in. Ditching his home over populated by little siblings, Skywarp, as a Sparkling, used his skills of cute silliness and clever theft to keep himself online. The two young mechs became good friends and had followed Starscream, the smartest Sparkling in their neighborhood, through numerous escapades and the failed employment at the home of Skyfire and his father. After that, though, when Skyfire dragged Starscream away for education, Thundercracker and Skywarp became best friends and brothers-in-arms as muscle-for higher until they got run out of their home town.

Now, Skywarp rubbed his head as he and Thundercracker caught their breaths in an alley way.

"Really, Thunder," Skywarp groaned, "Did we _have_ to run that fast?"

"Yes!" Thundercracker exclaimed. "That femme I was talking to at the bar--! She--! He--!"

Skywarp looked at Thundercracker then burst out laughing. Thundercracker pouted.

"It's _not_ funny!" he objected.

"It is!" Skywarp whooped. "Oh my Primus, Thundercracker, you were hitting on a _mech_!"

"Give the mech a cube of energon for stating the obvious, folks," Thundercracker grumbled.

"If it's so obvious, then why did you spend fifteen minutes buying him a drink?"

"Ah, shaddup, it's too early to drink, anyway," Thundercracker said, swatting Skywarp upside the head. "Come on, we gotta show up at work on time today or we're going to get fired."

Worried about getting fired—_that_ was a bit of irony for Thundercracker. He hated his job of being a warehouse crate mover with a passion. It was low and demeaning for a flying jet-Former like him self to work with the ground-bound muscle heads like cargo haulers, but what could he do? He and Skywarp needed the money and they certainly didn't have the brains to take up a better job that took them into the air. Skywarp had suggested joining the army—Decepticon or Autobot, he didn't specify—but Thundercracker had refused every time, choosing his personal freedom over being bossed around by some general or Prime. But sometimes, he wondered what it would be like to fight his way up to the position of a top auto-dog in one army or the other, and how different it would be to kill a civilian compared to a normal murder hit he and Skywarp weren't above doing.

Exiting the ally way, the two jet-Formers came back out into the main street of the factory town they were currently residing in. Amidst the miles and miles of warehouses making up the town, the main street that they were on was surprisingly well kept and clean: It was open spaced, the pavement and metal was smooth and flawless, the buildings were tall, broad, and polished, and there were even enormous advertising bill boards on the side of some of the buildings. The crowds rushed back and forth to or from social events and appeared to be enjoying themselves. As Thundercracker and Skywarp passed under one of the advertisement bill boards, Skywarp suddenly stopped and pointed up at one of the bill boards.

"Hey, look, it's Starscream!" he whooped.

Thundercracker glanced up and, sure enough, in the background of a news clip about yet another attack on a weapons factory somewhere, Starscream was flying around and shooting out avian Autobot drones. Thundercracker felt a bitter feeling twist in his Spark and he turned away.

"Yeah, yeah, great, come on," he grunted, "We gotta go, or we're not going to be paying rent this month."

"Okay, race ya!" Skywarp whooped. He transformed into his tetra jet form and disappeared in a purple flash, reappearing several feet in the air. Skywarp whooped excitedly as he blasted off into the clear lavender sky.

"Skywarp!" Thundercracker yelled.

He ran forward and jumped up. His back jets roared to life, taking him into the air and raining fire and fumes down on the people below him. He quickly left the complaints of the mechs below him behind as he flew into the air and transformed into his own tetra jet form, flying after Skywarp. Too quickly did they leave the well-kept streets behind and was soon flying over the dusty streets of the warehouse district making up their current home town. At this height, the warehouses were brown squares while the dirt that came from the desert around the town covered the pavement and made a light brown grid of the town.

"Skywarp, you idiot!" Thundercracker yelled at his friend, "Do you _want_ drafters to drag us into the army?"

"Nope," Skywarp said, spinning over in the air.

"Then don't show yourself off! And do you even know where you're going?"

Skywarp teleported to be on Thundercracker's right.

"Nope," he said.

"Well, then, come on," Thundercracker said, leading the way, "Primus, you're going to kill us someday, aren't you?"

"Hey, did you hear that?"

"Hear what?"

"It sounded like an explosion somewhere down there!"

"Probably just a muscle head dropping a shipment," Thundercracker sighed. "Hurry up or we're going to be—"

A distant boom caught Thundercracker's attention and he turned his sight downwards. Sure enough, one of the tiny brown squares marking a warehouse had been replaced by a white cloud of an explosion. Something flickered in the cloud and came up, slowly at first, but suddenly speeding up. It passed the two friends in an instant with a roar, making them both pull up short to avoid a crash. Thundercracker transformed into robot mode, keeping his jets active, and looked around at the clear lavender sky.

"What—what was _that_!?" he exclaimed.

"Is that it?" Skywarp asked transforming to robot mode and pointing behind them.

Thundercracker turned around and sure enough, the same speck from below was rocketing to them. As it came closer, red and white became apparent colors and Thundercracker's optics widened.

"No…" he whispered in disbelief. "No way…"

The jet-Former approaching them pulled up short, causing the air to explode around him as he finally dropped out of sound barrier-shattering speeds. The red and white tetra jet quickly took his robot mode.

"Thundercracker! Skywarp! Thank Primus, I need your help!" Starscream screamed.

"Screamer, hey, long time, no see, buddy!" Skywarp laughed as Thundercracker looked back to the ground. "Saw you on the news, mech. Nice job scoring the spot as one of the rising bad guys in the rebel ranks! Did you know you have a bounty on your processor?"

"Yeah, yeah, nice, hooray me, look," Starscream went on quickly. "My new boss, Lord Megatron, is a jerk and said that I've been doing well, but will only promote me into something above foot soldier if I can steal this prototype anti-avian weapons system that the Autobot Army is sneaking through here. Problem is, this prototype _works_ and is after _me_! I need help!"

"You mean _that_ prototype?" Thundercracker asked, his optics still pointed downward.

Starscream looked down, then squealed and blasted off into the sky as a strange device flew up from below and chased after him.

The device had eight crooked legs, each ending in a ball-shaped laser weapon. The eight crooked legs were attached to a single flat circle device in the center, hemmed in grey with a black center covering the machinery with in. A red, a blue, and a green light could be seen glowing in the black surface. Thundercracker and Skywarp watched as Starscream flew around and around the sky, desperately rolling and plunging to avoid the flying machine.

"Should we help him?" Skywarp asked when Starscream did a rapid barrel roll.

"Nah, let him roast," Thundercracker replied impersonally.

"Thundercracker!"

"What?" Thundercracker asked. He turned to Skywarp in time to miss seeing Starscream plunge out of sight.

"He's our friend!" Skywarp pouted. Starscream reappeared in view, now in robot mode and desperately shooting at the machine and missing it. The machine buzzed angrily and flew after Starscream.

"He left us behind to go study books and be a _scientist_," Thundercracker snarled. "Friends don't leave friends behind!"

"Come on, Thunder, he was trying to make himself a good life and we were gonna crash on his couch when he made it, remember?"

"He never even _called_ us after he left!"

"Oh quit your crying, Thundercracker, he's a friend, not an ex-girlfriend like, what's her name, the chick with the number in her name. Elite-Three? Four? Five? Eeja-Six? Something with an E and a number…"

"What?"

Starscream curled up into a ball to avoid the shots. The prototype machine flew up to him and whacked him in the back end with all its tentacles, knocking him into the sky and bouncing him like a sports ball.

"You know the pretty one with an attitude!"

"No, I mean, what, as if in 'what does that entire metaphor mean'? Skywarp, that femme was the one who kept throwing energon into your face every time you talker to her."

"A metaphor is when you use 'like' or 'as', Thundercracker. I'm using an analogy."

"No, that's a simile," Thundercracker snapped. "Starscream probably would know the difference, the smart aft."

"Well, we can't ask him what's what when he's dead," Skywarp said, watching as Starscream escaped his ball position, turned into a jet and rocketed away.

The prototype weapon looked around as Thundercracker and Skywarp exchanged glances. Skywarp grinned. Thundercracker hung his shoulders and sighed as he rolled his optics and covered his optics with a hand.

"I can't believe I'm agreeing to this," he groaned. "Alright, fine, we'll save his snobby little aft."

He transformed and sped on a head while Skywarp punched the air and cheered, "Alright!"

Skywarp transformed into jet mode and rocketed after Thundercracker. Thundercracker caught up on Starscream's left and Skywarp, on his right.

"It's about time you two made up your minds!" Starscream snarled impatiently.

"Watch your mouth, Starscream, or I'll regret this pretty quickly," Thundercracker growled.

"So, what's the plan?" Skywarp asked.

Here, Thundercracker kept his mouth shut, knowing full well that Starscream would always make a better plan than him.

"I need to bring this prototype back in one piece," Starscream explained. "The problem is not only is it shooting at me, but it's also amazingly durable, so this is going to be tough. Standard weaponry will shake it up, though, so you can let it all out. Just stop when you start breaking it."

"So… shoot the slag out of the weapon?" Skywarp asked.

"That's the idea," Starscream agreed. "Do you have weapons?"

"We're mercenaries for hire!" Thundercracker laughed, allowing a missile to pop out of one of his wings in preparation and show. "Of _course_ we have weapons!"

"Let's do it!" Skywarp cheered.

"Alright, go!" Starscream yelled.

As one, the three jets suddenly pulled up, doing a complete back flip through the air and coming down, right-side-up, behind the prototype machine. The prototype weapon halted and spun around. It recognized two more targets and raised its many arms to begin the battle, but the three jet-Formers acted first. All three sped forward, releasing a shower of missiles and laser fire on the prototype and knocking it around badly. Upon passing the proto-type, Thundercracker went left, Skywarp went right, and Starscream did another back flip so that they re-met behind the machine and repeated the maneuver.

They hadn't rehearsed the attack, and didn't need to. Some sort innate ability of communication and understanding had been constructed between the three jets when they were Sparklings long ago, and that understanding had not been demolished in their years apart, but rather, somehow, had strengthened.

They had just gathered up again for their third pass when the lights on the prototype weapon blinked thrice before dimming out and it began to fall. Skywarp teleported down, turning back into his robot mode, and caught the prototype in his arms. He smiled proudly up at Thundercracker and Starscream.

"Hmm, not bad," Starscream said with his hands on his hips and a smile on his face. "You know, I think I just might have an idea for this."

- - - - -

"….Starscream, have you been cloning yourself again?"

"No, Lord Megatron," Starscream chuckled. "These are colleagues of mine from long ago, Skywarp and Thundercracker. Skywarp may be an idiot, but he can teleport, and Thundercracker is an _exceptionally_ strong mech. They are the ones who aided in the capturing of the prototype weapon, as you commanded, sir."

Megatron grunted in acknowledgement as he looked over the prototype weapon in his hands. The three jet-Formers were currently gathered in one of the Decepticons' hidden bases on an asteroid somewhere in space. It had taken much coaxing to talk Thundercracker into coming here, but eventually he had agreed. Skywarp, of course, heard "energon" and "battle" in the same sentence and rushed off to come to the hidden base before remembering that he didn't know the way.

"You know, it was a suicide mission, Starscream," Megatron said, looking at the prototype.

Starscream's wings dropped as his shoulders slumped in disbelief. Skywarp and even Thundercracker had to hold back snickers of laughter.

"But," Megatron went on, handing the prototype weapon to Shockwave standing by his throne, "You _have_ proven yourself. So, these mechs, Thundercracker and Skywarp, are not of any relation to you?"

"No!" Thundercracker and Skywarp exclaimed in disgust.

"But you work well together," Megatron went on.

"We kicked that proto-whatsit's aft, didn't we?" Skywarp asked, punching the air.

Megatron muttered something like an agreement as he looked down, losing himself in thought. Nodding with confidence, he stood and spoke.

"Starscream, not only have you proven to be a good soldier, but appear to have some leadership skills in you, despite your many, many, many, many, many—"

"I get it," Starscream grunted.

"_Many_ faults," Megatron said, shooting a look at Starscream. "Hence, I will further test your leadership skills by giving you these mechs to command under a squad called the Seekers."

"Seekers?" Skywarp asked, "Who're the Hiders?"

"Not 'Seekers' as if in hide-and-seek, you ninny!" Starscream snapped, turning on Skywarp, "'Seekers' as if in a reference to the fighting parties of elites in the old times in the original war before the Golden Age! Back then, the Seekers were a party of soldiers that were especially alike in a shared ability of some sort, such as _our_ flying capabilities and identical body shells!"

"Ohhhhhh," Skywarp said.

"The leader of the Seekers was also the second-in-command of its army and—"

Starscream stopped short and turned to Megatron, his optics widening in surprise.

"Does… does that mean I'm…?" Starscream asked.

Megatron nodded. "Do _not_ make me regret this decision, Starscream."

"Woo hoo, more party privileges!" Skywarp cheered.

Starscream sighed and shook his head while Megatron smirked and exited the room with Shockwave following him.

"I'll leave you to settle your new _team mates_ in, Starscream," Megatron said slyly.

Thundercracker watched Megatron go then looked at Starscream.

"That guy just screwed you over, didn't he?" he asked.

"Yes, Thundercracker," Starscream sighed, watching Skywarp as he tilted his head back to look at the ceiling. Skywarp overbalanced and fell on his back. "Yes, he did."

**AN: Any non-Earth origin Transformers can be requested to make their own appearance in the story. If their origin wasn't fully revealed in the original G1 Transformers cartoon, feel free to request them.**


	12. Sunstreaker and Sideswipe

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers, and I claim no dibs on any of it.**

**Chapter 12: Sunstreaker and Sideswipe**

The scent of crude oil, old energon, and rusting, forgotten metal foods left on the floor filled the air, giving the arena a dirty, but familiar smell of a rough place. In the shadows surrounding the ring, he heard the crowd cheering him on, telling him to kill the other mech and beat him down, which was exactly what he was doing. A left hook, right hook, and a final punch to the face was more than enough to make his opponent sway on his feet with a dazed, pain look. Now, he could either finish the unlucky mech up with a dramatic KO punch, but the paint on his yellow knuckles had already been chipped enough for him tonight. Hence, he placed his energon-covered hands on his hips and blew on the opponent, providing the last bit of force to cause them to sway and fall over, completely unconscious. The referee counted off the time, then took his hand and held it over his head.

"The winner is Sunstreaker!" the referee shouted to the cheering crowd.

Sunstreaker basked in the cheers of approval his fans gave him as he was given his reward money and trophy. Ah, no matter how many times he did it, it never got old! Stepping out of the ring, he saw his usual flock of friends and femmes waiting for him. The face he noticed first was that of a young red mech's grinning one while he clutched bags of energon credits to himself.

"Guess how much I won this time, Sunny?" Sunstreaker's brother whooped.

"How much, Sideswipe?" Sunstreaker asked as a femme instantly came to his side and he wrapped his arm around her.

"Enough to get us to the _Cybertronian Gladiator Tournament!"_ Sideswipe yelled.

Everyone in the group cheered loudly and even Sunstreaker laughed triumphantly.

"Oh, Sunstreaker, I'm so proud of you!" the femme at Sunstreaker's side squealed, hugging his neck.

"Thanks, Sparksie," Sunstreaker laughed, hugging the small, glittering silver femme. "Come on, everyone; let's go back to my place for some energon and a victory party!"

The group cheered and raced each other out of the fighting arena that was being emptied of its customers. Once they were outside in the warm clear night, they assumed their vehicle forms and sped off with Sunstreaker, Sideswipe, and Sunstreaker's girlfriend, Sparksie, leading the way. Soon enough, they came to the large gym that the twins lived at and made their way up to the apartment over the gym. A little while later, the energon flowed, the music blared, and Sunstreaker sat on the couch with Sparksie in his lap while Sideswipe counted off their credits on the table in front of them.

"…5,478, 5,479, 5,480—hey! We got 80 extra!" Sideswipe whooped.

"I know: I scored all the time bonuses because I'm _just that good_," Sunstreaker said proudly.

"Are you really gonna do it, Sunstreaker?" Sparksie asked. "Are you really gonna go into the Boxer's Branch of the Cybertronian Gladiator Champion ship and become the King of Boxers?"

"Not if he can't beat me," a grey-blue and white mech said, approaching them.

"Hey, Lunar, you iron-fisted slagger, what's up?" Sunstreaker chuckled, standing and exchanging a hand shake with the other boxer. "Still beating around Sparklings?"

"They're learning to fight better than _you_ are, Sunny," Lunar bantered back. "At least they don't just flat-out beat the sludge out of each other."

"There's something more to boxing?"

"Don't forget that I've defeated you three times out of the five times we met in the ring now, boy."

" 'Boy'!? Please, you're only older by three years! And I'll have you know that I _let_ you beat me those three times; I'm too good to be defeated by a half-bit like you."

"Still the same old, vain Sunstreaker, I see," Lunar chuckled, taking the insult with good nature. "So I suppose that means that your little brother's hanging out with bad kids, too?"

"Hey, hey, first of all, we're only a minute apart in creation," Sideswipe argued. "And second; the crew I'm running with his clean! They're good people."

"Yeah, good people that happen to crash on our couch more often then not and refuse to pay the rent," Sunstreaker said, rolling his optics. "I'm just glad you've always had the faith to bet on me. Get the money to the bank so that it'll be safe. CGC sign ups start tomorrow and I want the money to be ready for us to pay for the hotel and sign ups."

"Can you believe it, Sunstreaker?" Sparksie asked, "After all these years of working, you've finally checked in enough fighting hours and have the money to go to the big time!"

"I know, right?" Sunstreaker asked. "And—hold on, let's go to the roof for some privacy, glitter bug."

Taking Sparksie's own small glittery silver hand in his large yellow one, Sunstreaker led Sparksie to the stairs taking them to the roof. Several of the party comers whooped and whistled at them. Sunstreaker stopped and flashed them a dirty hand signal with good humor before continuing on to the dark, quiet roof of the gym-apartment building. He took Sparksie over to the side with a view of the street and took her hands in his.

"Sparksie," Sunstreaker said after a calming moment. "We've known each other for a while now, and, well, I've liked you ever since Sideswipe introduced me to you as 'the femme whose boyfriend left because he couldn't handle her beauty'."

Sparksie giggled and Sunstreaker felt his Spark flutter lovingly.

"Well, we've been dating for two and a half years now, and I haven't looked at another femme like I have looked at you, and I have never thought about a femme like I've thought of you. Heh, I've certainly never given any _other_ femme the nickname 'glitter bug'. My point is, Sparksie, that when I get back from the Cybertronian Gladiator Championships…"

He kept her hands in his as he knelt.

"Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife-unit?"

Sparksie's light blue optics widened as her jaw dropped in a gasp. But a second later, her head began to bob, making her cable-made pony tail bounce up and down eagerly.

"Yes, Sunstreaker! Yes, and yes, I do! I do!" she gasped.

A happy smile crossed Sunstreaker's face as he stood up and hugged Sparksie close to himself. He loved the boxing ring, no question about that. He loved venting all his violence and temper into the fight, but he loved this little femme more and had reached that point in his life where he was ready to put up the trophies and start taking care of his own Sparklings. Even if he didn't win the CGC and never became the King of Boxers, it wouldn't matter as long as Sparksie stood at his side.

- - - -

The next day, all of Sideswipe's and Sunstreaker's friends were there to see them off at the junction where the turnpike of their city met the global highway that would take them to the next city over where they would sign up for the CGC. Sunstreaker kept trying to count how many Transformers there were, but everyone kept moving around and gave up after the third time he reached twenty-seven bodies. Man, had he _really _made that many friends in his adventures as a boxer? He knew that he had helped defend gyms from rival gangs on more than one occasion, and had even given up his CGC funds on more than one occasion to help someone that needed the credits more, but still: It was surprising to know that he had made so many friends, and nice, too.

Sideswipe assured him that thirty-six people had shown up to see them off. People joked with the brothers and gave them last-minute donations as spending money at the championships. The friends promised to watch them on the television or come and see them in person. Sideswipe's ill-chosen friends showed up, of course, stumbling drunk and slur-tongued. But there was only one person Sunstreaker needed to see before he left.

Upon finding Sparksie, Sunstreaker held her one last time and shared a long, slow kiss with her.

"Watch out for the sore losers," she whispered. "They might fight dirty."

"I'll beat them no matter what way they punch me," Sunstreaker replied quietly.

"Sunstreaker!" Lunar called. "Are you going to beat the morning rush hour or are you planning on _walking_ to the Championships?"

"Shut up and go brag about your best fighting student, Lunar!" Sunstreaker called to his old fighting partner, opponent, and teacher. He gave Sparksie one final kiss on the cheek.

"Wish me luck," Sunstreaker said.

"I love you," Sparksie squeaked.

To this, Sunstreaker smiled warmly and replied, "I love you too, glitter bug."

Sparksie smiled up to Sunstreaker. Suddenly, Sideswipe grabbed at Sunstreaker's arm and pulled him away, towards the entrance to the global highway.

"Come _on_, Sunny!" Sideswipe insisted. "We gotta beat the traffic!"

Sunstreaker stared at Sparksie over his shoulder before he finally followed his brother through their transforming sequence. In spite of being two different mechs in personality and robot form, in their vehicle alt-forms, they both took the form of super fast, sleek, sharp-cornered, and almost flat speed craft.

Sideswipe revved his engine eagerly as they came to the entrance of the global highway, looking for a gap in the ten-lane traffic. Upon seeing such a gap, Sideswipe's rich red form sped into the road, his tires screeching on the pavement. Sunstreaker followed, swinging his bright yellow form around to follow his brother. Both brothers quickly picked up speed to keep up with the traffic. When they were going fast enough, their tires folded up and tucked into them as they maneuvered to drive in the inner-most, fastest lane on the highway. Soon, they had left their home town behind and were racing down the highway over rocky wilderness and town-embedded canyons, speeding off to their dreams and destiny.

Sideswipe told Sunstreaker about the hotel he had booked for them selves, expressing his unexpected skill at being Sunstreaker's manager. In spite of Sideswipe's lack of seriousness and his bad taste in friends, he proved to be an adept manager. Once the plans had been confirmed, Sideswipe drifted to the side to start making idle conversation with a rather attractive femme motorcycle. Sunstreaker, though, eschewed flirting at he already planned on the life he and Sparksie would share together a month from now, when the championships were over.

"Glitter bug…" he whispered, taking comfort from the name.

- - - -

Several hours later, the twins had finally made their way through the city where the GCG was being held in and entered their room, already drawing bags from their sub-space compartments to remove the weight that they felt around them from carrying such luggage. The hotel was modest, and yet, hinted of a snazzy party: The colors were of primary whites and grays, but the way the furniture was arranged and built suggested that the hotel was ready to replace them if the roomers wanted to practice in 'extra curricular activities', such as a room-destroying party.

"Wow, bro! Look at this!" Sideswipe exclaimed, dropping his bags and running over to a large window to look out over the city. "The view is _awesome_! Did your brother score? Or did your brother _score?_"

"Yeah, yeah, shut up and get some sleep, turbo-rat," Sunstreaker yawned, dropping down onto the bed. "We gotta get registered tomorrow and squeeze in some last-minute training before the championships start in a week."

"You mean _you _gotta register and train: I just handle the money and gamble on you," Sideswipe laughed.

"Yeah, but you remember the deal we made?" Sunstreaker reminded. "I'd let you mooch off of me, but _only_ if you trained with me so that I can keep an optic on you."

"Aww, man, I hate training; it's _so_ boring!"

"Well, maybe if you had known _that_, you wouldn't have gotten yourself kicked out of Mom and Dad's place. Now get into that recharge booth by the door and get charged up. We have a big day ahead of us tomorrow."

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," Sideswipe grumbled, going over to the glass-topped, horizontally-laid charging booth. "Jerk… Hey! There's room for two in this booth! Kinky."

"Pervert," Sunstreaker said with a smile as he shut down his systems.

Not even a minute after both brothers had fallen asleep, a force of tetra jets and other fighter avian craft flew by over head, making the windows of their room shake and rattle in their settings and the building rumble. Many people looked up at the force fearfully, but when it passed on, they released sighs of relief and went on with their usual business, being too grateful to question their good luck.

- - - -

A metal booted foot struck Lunar in the face and a fist followed after, knocking him back onto the ground. He coughed and spat some energon out, making a small, violent splatter spot of glowing purple fluid on the pavement. Around them, fire alarms and sirens howled in panic and the screams of the fleeing victims could be heard.

"We ask you again," a gruff voice snarled, "Are you with or against us?"

Lunar glared up at his opponent with his one good optic, the other already punched out of his white face. He was cracked, severely dented, and aching, but he didn't feel it; he had gotten worse injuries in _bar fights_.

To answer his opponent, he lunged up with a violent roar and punched his opponent with all his might.

- - - -

"Name?"

"Sunstreaker."

"Occupation?"

"Boxer."

"Secondary occupation?"

"Personal trainer."

"Any other occupations?"

"None."

"Branch of the Cybertronian Gladiator Championships you want to join?"

"Boxer branch."

"Are there any disabilities, special abilities, allergies, or medical conditions that we should be aware of?"

"No... Except that I'm awesome."

Sunstreaker had waited long enough in line to finally make it to the counter and was answering all questions he was given so that the mech behind the counter could fill out the proper forms to admit him into the tournament. Behind Sunstreaker, dozens of mechs stood waiting their turn, just like in the lines on either side of Sunstreaker in the enormous Battle Stadium they were in. High over head, the smoked glass walls curved into their dome shape and enormous screens were mounted on the wall to tell the crowds below about numerous events in the stadium and the news. Sideswipe stood near Sunstreaker, but was flirting with a femme in another line.

"Home address?" the counter mech asked.

"The Bolt Fist Gym at 3367, Rocket Street, in Oilscump," Sunstreaker replied.

The counter mech looked up at Sunstreaker, then up at one of the wall-mounted screens and pointed.

"You mean _that_ Oilscump?" the counter mech asked.

Curious, and annoyed at the delay, Sunstreaker turned and looked to where the other mech was pointing. But upon seeing the TV screen, his optics bulged and he gasped. Hearing him, Sideswipe looked at Sunstreaker, then up at the TV screen as well.

The news was presenting a breaking report, showing a town where Decepticon rebels and towns people were fighting each other. The sound was mute, but the words running across the screen were all Sunstreaker needed to confirm his worse fears:

"_Decepticon rebels attack town of Oilscump. Fighting started at approximately 2:15 AM at weapons plant and spread to whole city. Autobot soldiers entering town to stop fight. Death toll expected in the hundreds."_

Sideswipe's attention was torn from the screen when Sunstreaker seized his brother by his shoulder with excess strength and ran to the door, dragging his brother with him.

"Come on!" Sunstreaker yelled.

"Oww, Sunny!" Sideswipe complained. "But what about our stuff at the hotel--?"

"Forget about it!" Sunstreaker ordered, releasing Sideswipe to turn into his vehicle form. He revved his engine at the crowds in front of him as Sideswipe also took his vehicle form.

"_MOVE!!"_ Sunstreaker bellowed.

The crowd jumped out of the way and Sunstreaker sped out of the battle arena with Sideswipe following close behind him. Sunstreaker drove out of the city as fast as he could, cutting through traffic lights and taking enough illegal short cuts to make him worthy of a year of jail time. Once out of the city, he put on all his speed to race down the highway with Sideswipe following him. If someone was too slow for Sunstreaker, he passed them. If the way was blocked, he merely transformed and vaulted over the blockage before resuming his vehicle form. Sunstreaker had forgotten about the tournament, his few worldly belonging at the hotel, and the money in the bank that he had fought for to get him to his dreams, he had forgotten everything. Now, all he could think about was getting back to Oilscump, and back to Sparksie.

Soon, the traffic mysteriously thinned out, but Sunstreaker only knew that that meant he was getting closer: no one wanted to be near a war zone, after all.

"Sunny!" Sideswipe suddenly exclaimed. "They have the road barricaded up ahead!"

Sure enough, Sunstreaker could see an army-issue cargo hauler crossing the road with several army mechs surrounding it, barring innocents from going on. Sunstreaker revved his engine to indicate that he didn't care and only sped up. Understanding, Sideswipe did like wise.

The army mechs waved for them to stop. The twins ignored them, choosing, instead, to leap up and transform, vaulting clear over the cargo hauler and by-passing the barricade. Once on the other side, they transformed back into vehicle forms and sped on to the smoking area on the horizon. The soldiers never even got a chance to yell for the twins to stop.

As they approached their home town of Oilscump, the fear in Sunstreaker's and Sideswipe's Sparks grew. They entered the town and were dismayed to find buildings smoking and on fire or completely destroyed. The bodies of the dead laid about like grey marble statues and the injured or terrified survivors hid in the shadows. Sunstreaker sped by these sad victims, going straight for his and Sideswipe's gym home. When they got there, they found the gym doors blown off and hanging crookedly on their hinges. Inside, the equipment had been thrown about and broken. Sunstreaker came to a side-ways stop in the doorway and transformed.

"Lunar! Sparksie!" he hollered, "Where are you?"

He ran into the gym, seeking his friends. Sideswipe also transformed and stood outside of the gym, looking around with wide, terrified blue optics. For Sideswipe, Sunstreaker always knew how to keep the danger away. But this time, it looked like not even Sunstreaker could protect Sideswipe from the danger. He briefly wondered if his friends were okay, but he seriously looked at his friends' profile: The way they always drank, how they mooched off of everyone they could, how they had run away from more than one fight. No, Sideswipe had to admit that his "friends" had probably skipped town when the fighting started and were not coming back.

Sideswipe spotted a couple of bodies near by and felt his Spark go rigid in horror. Sunstreaker exited the gym, panting heavily.

"They're not in there," Sunstreaker panted, "Maybe they got out of town—"

Sideswipe grabbed Sunstreaker's arm and pointed to the bodies. Sunstreaker turned and saw the bodies, and he, too, went rigid.

"No…" he whispered, darting forward.

Sunstreaker dropped to his knees with a bang of metal on pavement and took the first body up in his arms; it was Lunar, bashed and broken almost beyond recognition. Lunar coughed up a large amount of energon and grumbled. He looked up at Sunstreaker with his one good, cracked optic and smiled sadly.

"Sunny…" Lunar whispered. "You came back?"

"Of-of course I did," Sunstreaker said, choking, "You guys needed help."

Lunar coughed up some more energon and Sunstreaker pleaded, "Don't—don't talk, it'll be okay, you'll see, Lunar. We'll get you fixed up and—and you'll get to fight me more and make jokes about my vanity and how much better than me. Heck, I'll even let you win!"

Lunar smiled and emitted a single chuckled as he nodded.

"Sure, kid," Lunar said quietly. "And I'll get you to purposefully scratch up your paintjob and _like_ it."

Sunstreaker smiled weakly and said, "Y-Yeah, I'll do that—"

"Don't fool your self, Sunstreaker," Lunar sighed, "I'm done for. But don't blame yourself. I'm just glad that… you… came back… so I could say… good bye…"

Sunstreaker opened his mouth to protest, but it became an "O" of horror when the light faded from his friend's optic and he became limp and heavy in his arms. The blue and white faded from Lunar, turning him grey. Sunstreaker could only sit there on the pavement, holding his friend's body. Sunstreaker waited for Lunar to sit up with a loud shout, showing that it was a cruel prank, for the color to return to his friend, for life to return to his friend, but none of this happened.

"Sunny…"

Sunstreaker looked up and saw Sideswipe standing in front of him, holding the body of a small, dainty femme in his arms. But the sparkles had gone from her frame and laser burns burnt right through her abdomen, staining it with dull, dead purple energon that made a contrast to her grey frame.

Sunstreaker sat back, his optics zoning out in horror. In his processor, every smile, every laugh, every friendly swat and scolding and wonderful night created by that femme were suddenly immortalized as something wonderful that had been taken away from him. Inside, all emotion, all anger, all sadness, all pain, all _everything_ disappeared from Sunstreaker, slipping down a drainage hole and leaving behind a hollow shell. Sparksie, the one and only femme he had ever truly cared about, the one he was going to start a family with, had been taken away from the vain mech as some cruel joke of the universe.

Metal boots clomped in an alley across the street from them and several Transformers came out. The Decepticon symbols proudly stamped on their persons and the energon flecking their armor showed who they were.

"Hey, look, boys," one of them said, drawing his gun. "We missed some!"

Sunstreaker's optics snapped around and looked at the Decepticons. Sideswipe stared at the Decepticons as well. A strange, cool, ghost-like glow came to both the brothers' optics, as if possessed by an unworldly power. After a moment, Sideswipe slowly put the body of Sparksie down while Sunstreaker settled Lunar down and stood up. Both brothers turned to the Decepticons, cable muscles flexing as they clenched their fists.

- - - -

An Autobot general was speaking with his scouts at their temporary camp when the scouts saw something behind the general and their optics widened in shock as they stumbled back. The general, thinking that they were spotting more Decepticons, turned around, drawing his gun and ready to spill more energon. Primus, these Decepticons just didn't stop coming, did they?

But an energon-splattered hand seized the front of his armor and yanked him forward. The general's own optics widened in shock as his mouth moved mutely when he saw the Transformers behind him. His gun even fell from his hand in shock.

The red one was smaller and had energon covering his fists and feet, but his yellow comrade, the one with black wing-like ear fins and holding the general, had energon all up and down his arms, legs, and splattering his side. It was even around his neck and face, as if his victim had attempted to force him off of them. A clear hand print was on the yellow Transformer's cheek; a final signature of some unlucky fool lying dead and in pieces somewhere. The red one looked somewhat dazed and tired, as if in shock at what he had done. The yellow one, how ever, still had the fire of pure rage and murderous tendencies glowing in his optics.

What the yellow Transformer said was too surreal and strange in such a situation to be believed at first.

"We want to join the Autobots. Tell us no, and I will be forced to reunite you with your dead troops."

**AN: Requests for non-Earth origin Transformers is open.**


	13. Prowl and Bluestreak

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and the author claims no rights to them.**

**Chapter 13: Prowl and Bluestreak**

He put his signature on a final hologram-form document before shuffling the papers all together in one file. Standing up with the file in hand, the silver and black police-bot walked over to one of the several filing cabinets in the corner of the room, pulled out a drawer, tucked the file in amongst the hundreds of other files stuck in it, and shut the file again. Sighing, he whipped a hand across his forehead. Behind him, a trio of other police mechs ran by on their way out the door. He turned and watched the trio bolt out, followed by a small group of other mechs. All the mechs carried a V-shaped red badge on their foreheads; the symbol of a Transformer police officer.

"I don't see why you don't go join them, Prowl. Primus knows you have more skills and more _sense_ than them," a larger, dark blue and white mech said as he approached.

"_Someone_ has to watch the base, Chief," Prowl replied.

"Yes, but it doesn't necessarily have to be you," Chief replied.

"Come now, Chief, there are more than enough mechs out there helping to defend the city—"Prowl began to object.

"There are never enough mechs, not when we're defending our homes from the Decepticons," Chief interrupted. "And Primus knows that those rookies that just went out the door are going to go charging in, over confident, and get themselves blown half way to the Kyron sector. So, as your police chief and superior, I am _ordering you_ to go after those rookies and make sure none of them get killed!"

Prowl had always followed ruled and orders, and did not break this streak now by saluting his commander and heading out the exit. He was a reluctant fighter, and in the rare times he had used force during his service as a police officer, he had applied it in such a way that he was well known for his skills. Even Chief knew it, and hence had known that he was doing well to make Prowl go after the over-eager rookies to watch their backs.

The inside of the police station had been white, polished, and cleaned with a disciplinary appeal. Outside, how ever, was like walking through a space bridge into another world.

The streets were broken, the buildings smashed, and the peach sky was orange with fire and smoke. Fire alarms went untended as they rang and civilian mechs frequently darted across the street, holding what few precious belongings they had left close to themselves as they fled the battlefield that was slowly consuming the city. Keeping a calm exterior, Prowl transformed into his hover craft form and drove towards the very area of violence that so many victims were fleeing.

It didn't take him long to come to the battlefield, where buildings were being blown apart in the violent thrashes of the battle raging among them. Behind a lone standing wall of one ruined building, Prowl found five of the rookies that had ran out a while ago. Most appeared very much like himself, with similar or near-identical body castings, but all had just enough contrast to be their own mech. All carried the same V-shaped horn badge on their foreheads. One such mech was grey and red; a rookie transfer from some other town. As much as Prowl liked to keep an optic on the paper work, he had been slipping up lately due to nervousness concerning the war.

"…and then we'll come up behind the exhaust pipe-sucking slaggers, blowing their miniscule-excuse of processors out of the water, and all around slag 'em up!" the red and grey transferred rookie was saying.

"A lot of bold words," Prowl said, driving up behind them. "But does it have any mech to back them up?"

"O-Officer Prowl!" the foul-mouthed rookie exclaimed as everyone turned to Prowl, "What are you doing here?"

"I see why they call you Scarlet Smudge," Prowl told the rookie. "But your language needs some polishing up. I was sent here by Chief to make sure none of you Sparklings got yourselves killed."

"S-Sparklings??" another rookie exclaimed. "We're no Sparklings! Go home, we got this place covered."

"Oh, yeah?" Prowl asked. "I counted ten of you leaving the station. Where are the other five?"

"We split up and…" Scarlet Smudge began before looking away.

Prowl saw everyone look away with shame and grief on their faces and nodded in understanding.

"It's not as simple as merely charging in and killing the other mech, boys," Prowl said. "Now, I would _like_ to order you all back to the station, but the Autobots need our help. We'll report to the Autobot leader and have him give our orders. He _should_ be stationed at where the old market was. Follow me, and stay close."

Drawing his gun, Prowl peeked around the side of the ruin's wall. When he was sure that none of the soldiers fighting near by would notice, he motioned for everyone to follow and snuck forward, bent over and looking about warily. From the wall to a pile of rubble to a pile of over-turned vehicles to another wall and on, Prowl led his party. When they were ambushed, Prowl quickly barked out from where they were being shot at and the rookies would naturally turn to that area and shoot until they were relatively safe again. Every time the towering shape of a larger Decepticon appeared from the clouds of smoke and dust wafting across the ground, Prowl's Spark would momentarily freeze up before he shot. The _size_ of those mechs--! It was just not natural, building a Transformer to be that big in the name of war!

Finally, Prowl spotted a small camp made of cargo hauler Transformers' trailers and motioned for the party to stay where they were in a small corral made of debris.

"Stay here while I go talk to the Autobot captain," he ordered. "Keep your processors down and don't draw attention to yourselves."

Leaving the nervous group of rookies behind, Prowl bounded over to the camp, dodging stray laser shots and ducking his head every time a flying mech swooped by over head. Finally, he came up to the cargo hauler trailers. Soldiers guarded the gap between the trailers and these guards stopped Prowl when he approached.

"Halt! What is it, soldier?" one of the guards asked.

"I am officer Prowl of this city's police force," Prowl replied with a salute. "My self and a small party of others wish to be given orders as to how we may help the battle."

"We want orders, too, believe me, but our leader got his processor ripped off about an hour ago in battle."

"Oh no," Prowl groaned.

"Hey, Prowl!" Scarlet Smudge exclaimed, appearing beside Prowl. "What's the hold up?"

"The Autobot leader was killed earlier today," Prowl told the rookie. To the guards, "So you mean to say that this force is fighting with no direction?"

"Pretty much," the guard admitted.

"Oh, slag, that's not good," Scarlet Smug muttered. "Slagging Decepticons are going to shove their stabilizing servos so far up our aft we won't know whether we're getting our circuits polished or fried…"

"You swear a blue streak, don't you?" one of the guards chuckled.

"What's a blue streak?" Scarlet Smudge asked.

"I don't know, but it seems fitting so I'm calling you that from now on," Prowl announced. To the guards, "Alright, I know this place like the back of my hand. You, take a force of twenty mechs and go up South Silicon Street and clean the bridge you'll find at the end. That should keep any more ground forces from coming. You, the other guard, take a force of fifteen snipers, go to the top of that building over there, and start shooting Decepticons from the air. It might not look like it from here, but that building has a clear view of the city for miles around. It also has some old temple at the top that can provide a lot of cover. I'll get the force ordered down here. Bluestreak—"

"I'm Scarlet Smudge!"

"Not any more. Bluestreak, go get the other mechs and get them over here. We're going to do some heavy fighting!"

In the following short, but grueling hours of battle, under the direction of Prowl, the Autobots successfully managed to push the Decepticons back almost to the edge of the city. No one questioned who they were getting orders from, being too busy fighting for their lives to stop and wonder who was saying what. Prowl fought along side the mechs and gave orders when ever a messenger bot came up to him telling him of some new development in the battle. He almost didn't notice when reinforcements came in, giving them the last final push to make the Decepticons retreat.

With the Decepticons flying away, Prowl finally allowed himself to sit down on a pile of rubble, panting heavily as his hot laser rifle dangled in limp, sore fingers. Bluestreak limped over to Prowl and sat down hard with a clatter of metal.

"Whew!" he sighed," What a tussle in the energon hay, ay? I mean, first it was all just 'shoot the slaggers out', then the energon covered everyone like the biological waste of an organic and I couldn't see the symbols so well any more and my optics started stinging like a red district femme and—"

"Bluestreak," Prowl panted. "If you want to continue to accompany me, I insist on you cleaning up your language."

The younger mech's optics clicked on and off in surprise before he smiled.

"Oh, sorry, Prowl, it's just the way I grew up," he replied. "I had a lot of siblings growing up and we all learned a little from everywhere, so we all grew up with a lot of bad words we heard from around. Did you have a lot of siblings growing up, Prowl? I had eight. They were going to a refugee planet before the war hit. Kyron 5, I think the planet was. A lot of people have gone to Kyron 5. It's a nice planet. A bit lacking in the beauty department, but I heard that the caves are filled with pretty glowing crystal and it's real hardy, perfect to protect people against Decepticon attacks. That, and the asteroid cloud around it doesn't hurt, either. How about you, Prowl? Did any one you know go to Kyron 5?"

"My parent units," Prowl said a bit quickly, getting in a word before the talkative rookie could interrupt. "I was an only Sparkling, but I had a good life. Good education, a stern, but a good teacher of a father, balanced with my mother's tender love and—hold on, wait a moment, you said you had eight siblings!?"

"Nine, actually, including myself," Bluestreak confirmed with a nod. "But I heard of this one family of jet-Formers a few blocks from us that had seventeen mechs! One of 'em ran away to the Decepticons, I heard…"

"Wow," Prowl said, shaking his head. "No wonder why you swear a lot. Your poor mother unit did it enough with eight little ones to take care of!"

"Hey!" Bluestreak laughed, shoving at Prowl playfully.

The two laughed a little. They were badly dented, burnt, and exhausted, surrounded by a crumbling city and the dead and dying, but it felt nice to have a bonding moment and make a friend even in these dark times. Everyone needed someone to lean on when the going got tough.

"Yeah, I loved them with all my Spark," Bluestreak said with a sad smile as his optics zoned out. "They were all so much _fun_ and united. I remember this one time, one of my little sisters got her head stuck in a waxing unit…"

Prowl listened to Bluestreak go on and on about his family for the next half hour. Sometimes he cussed, but a quick tap on the processor was enough to get him back on track. Finally, Bluestreak ran out of stories to tell and Prowl spoke.

"What happened to them?" Prowl asked.

"They… our city…" Bluestreak looked away. "Our city was totally wiped out. The only reason I survived is because I got transferred to this city's police unit."

Prowl's inner gears clicked to a stop momentarily, his optics flaring in shock. Suddenly, there was another reason to fight the Decepticons. All those happy times Bluestreak had just told him about, all those funny, loving moments, had just been wiped out by a bunch of over sized muscle heads who thought that they could just take what they want. No wonder why Bluestreak talked so much; he was trying to hold back the grief of losing his family.

"Bluestreak…" Prowl began.

"So, think I should paint myself?" Bluestreak asked, looking down at himself. "I certainly don't match my name! I mean, I won't look all that different: Just a bit of blue. Not something too bright, of course, because I don't want to be a walking target for the Decepticons…"

_He doesn't want to talk about it,_ Prowl thought, _Poor guy._

"I doubt anyone has the paint or the shop to change colors anymore," Prowl noted. "Don't worry about it: I'm called Prowl, but I'm not a stealth fighter, am I?"

"So, you're the mech who's been leading these troops?" a large mech branded with the winged Autobot Prime insignia said as he came up to the couple.

"Yes, sir," Prowl replied as he and Bluestreak stood and saluted, "Designation Prowl, police officer of this city's force."

"Well, Prowl, we're running rather short on squad leaders around here, and you've proven your metal. Ever since the Autobot Headquarters at Cyberopolis got blown all to Pit, we've been doing things a rather bit free handed lately. You're intelligent, disciplined, well-skilled in fighting, and above all, are able to command your troops. So, Prowl, what do you say about being a squad leader in the Autobot army?"

Prowl and Bluestreak exchanged surprised glances, but Prowl had only to briefly review things before getting his answer.

"I accept the position, sir," Prowl said.

"Good answer, mech," the superior officer said. "Gather your troops together and have them rest a while. I doubt the Decepticons will be back any time. An insignia will be provided for you shortly."

"Uh, can I get a symbol too, sir?" Bluestreak asked, quickly shooting his hand up. "I want to make sure the slagging Decepticon oil bags know who got them before I take 'em out like they took out my family."

Prowl tapped the rookie on the head with his gun.

The officer ignored the cussing and asked, "What is your name, soldier?"

The rookie hesitated, but grinned at Prowl as he answered, "Bluestreak, sir."

**AN: Origins for requests, as always, are open unless the requested mech's origins were described in the original G1 series. Examples: Constructicons, Dinobots, Omega Supreme, et cet.**


	14. Jazz

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and the author claims no rights to them.**

**Chapter 14: Jazz**

"Hey, everyone, this is your favorite DJ, Jazz, giving you non-stop tunes to shake your adorable aft to, can I get a shout from those mechs on the dance floor having a fun time tonight?"

Below him, the numerous young bots dancing on the flashing colored light floor below crowed to show their approval. Jazz grinned, the laser lights flashing off of his silver visor, and slid a mix music data pad into the sound system's slot.

"Alright then, here comes another hit, heading your way!"

The crowd cheered and began to dance to the music. Jazz cut off the microphone connection to and from the club's dance floor and let the smile slip from his face as he sat back in his chair and turned to another computer. The DJ booth Jazz was in had practically become a second home to the hansom, friendly black and white Transformer; he still had empty cubes of energon lying in the corner and under the counter from a long time ago when he had first bought the club and opened it up. Admittedly, he had never expected the club to do so well, and he was glad it had; it had done well enough that not only did Jazz had a cozy love nest above the club, but he had the coolest laser light shows and awesome sound systems to pump the music from. The problem with that was…

The music sucked.

Jazz had used to love it at one time, but constantly mixing and matching it in the DJ booth he had come to see the same dull pattern in all the electronic tones that made up a Cybertron music track. Looking at the young mechs dancing below his high-perched booth, Jazz couldn't help but grimace sometimes and wonder where they found the energy in this slag; it was dull, repeating, and lacked something, he didn't know, _more_.

He stared at the computer where he had been trying to make his own music track to fulfill the hole of creativity in him. Of course, no matter what he mixed it seemed like the club comers liked it, and _that_ was what ultimately mattered in the end. Still, he wanted to create something he could truly be proud of, something that would make him a legend all over Cybertron. Something that spoke without words, something that told a story with its different sounds: something that had a _Spark._

Sighing, he leaned back in his seat, linking his fingers behind his head as he stared up at the ceiling.

He had heard that on certain organic planets, organics were actually evolved enough to have developed their own instruments and styles of music. Maybe one of these days he would take a vacation and sink a bunch of money in a private trip to one of these planets and check them out, get some inspiration…

As Jazz drifted into recharge, a rare deep bass note began thumping outside as the laser light show became more and more bright, now drawing closer to a red and white color scheme. The cheery shouts of the dancers became screams of pain and roars of violence and the comfortable DJ chair became a hard bed of rubble while the DJ's dim darkness turned into a night sky.

"_Soldier, soldier! Wake up, soldier! Now is not the time to recharge, mech!"_

Jerking awake, Jazz sat up and looked around, but laid quickly back down as he placed a hand to his head to cover the leaking hole there. His squad leader was kneeling beside him and quickly placed his hand on Jazz's chest to keep him from sitting back up into the line of enemy fire.

"You alright, soldier?" his squad leader asked. "You took a rather nasty hit!"

"Yeah, yeah, I'm cool," Jazz replied. "A little shaken, but I'm cool."

"That's nice, because we have to shove the Decepticons out of here if we want to go home!" his squad leader said, peeking out at the battlefield.

Jazz and his squad leader were hiding behind a dismembered wing of their sabotaged starship in the flat land between the mines and the town of the asteroid they had been shipped to in order to defeat the Decepticon infestation there. A double agent though had sabotaged the ship; causing it to crash and scatter the Autobots to fight the Decepticons in lonely, tiny groups.

"So, getting your share of energon, soldier?" the squad leader said with a small smile.

"Join the army, I said," Jazz growled, sitting up enough to adjust the settings on his weapons. "Protect everyone you love, I said. It'll give you a refreshing draft of energon, I said. Yeah, right! My first day out of boot camp and I've been flung out of a sabotaged starship, crashed into some back-space mining asteroid, gotten shot at…"

In the distance, a giant brown metal Transformer creaked and groaned as he stomped over a force of Autobots.

"And _that_ is not helping!" Jazz yelled, pointing at the giant.

"What _is_ that?" the squad leader gasped.

"That's Goliath."

The two Autobots turned around to see a brawny dark red-blue femme and her slim, cerulean and silver mate had snuck up behind the two. Both looked worse for wear, but judging by the common weapons in their hands, they were locals.

"Hey, nice chin extension," Jazz said to the cerulean-silver mech. "Where can I get one?"

"It's called a goatee," the mech chuckled. "Special ordered. Want me to get you one?"

"What do you know about this Goliath, madam?" the squad leader asked the femme.

"The name is Shiva, and this is my husband-unit, Slicker. Goliath used to be the scrap yard hauler up on the mountain," the femme replied. "Then these _vagabonds_ appeared and talked him into working for them. Gah, we're screwed."

"Ah, yes, now I recognize him," the squad leader said, watching as the distant Goliath transformed into an enormous crane. "I saw him in his alt-mode when I arrested a black market dealer a few months ago…"

"So, how are we gonna bring the big boy down?" Jazz asked.

"With _this_," Shiva said, holding up her fire-gun arm.

A giant jet of flame leaped from the femme's arm and the other mechs stared with wide optics.

"Well," Jazz said. "_That_ works."

"He's getting in range, shall we all shoot together and hope for the best?" the squad leader asked.

"Sure," Slicker snickered, rubbing his hands together. "I got to help install mines in this section of ground earlier. When the slagger's about to step on 'em, I'll give you the signal and you can all open fire."

"Sure hope this works," Jazz muttered as everyone turned to Goliath as he slowly rolled towards them on his path of destruction in his crane form.

"And… now! Now! Now!" Slicker yelled.

"Open fire!" the squad leader ordered.

The four mechs stood up from their hiding place and opened fire, shooting up at Goliath to aim for the exposed wiring in between his enormous armor plates. In the sand down below, red lights briefly flashed before enormous puffs of flame leaped up, devouring the lower half of Goliath. Goliath half-transformed, wailing in pain before falling onto his back, becoming helpless to the Autobots and town natives who swarmed forward to finish the job.

"Wow!" Jazz exclaimed, "How much fire power was _in_ those mines!?"

"Enough," Slicker chuckled. "So, we finished here or what?"

"We won't be finished until the Decepticons are," the squad leader said. "In the mean time, we can use all the help we can get."

"No can do," Slicker sighed. "Shiva and I are retired from the battle scene. We're just gonna go to one of those refugee camps on Kyron 5 and watch you fellahs kick can from there. Oh, speaking of which, we gotta scram before the shuttle leaves!"

"My mech here and I will escort you to the shuttle," the squad leader offered, transforming into his alt-mode.

"The name's _Jazz_, sir," Jazz said as he and the couple transformed.

"I'm Prowl, soldier," Prowl replied. "Come along, Mr. Slicker and Ms. Shiva. Let's get you to safety…"

**AN: Any origins left unexplained in the Transformers' G1 series may be requested at anytime.**


	15. Ratchet

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and the author claims no rights to them.**

**Chapter 15: Ratchet**

Red metal hands were drenched in purple energon as he ever so carefully maneuvered the sharp tools around inside his unconscious patient's body. He moved some tubes back, gently melting holes closed, and occasionally looking at one of his assistant doctors so that they would go in and suck up some dark, clumpy, bad energon with their tools. He scanned the patient one last time, ensuring that no one had been dumb enough to leave a tool inside or leave anything unattended to. Confident, he backed away from the patient on the table. The five other nurses and doctors in the operating room looked exhausted and some were drenched in energon from working on their patient.

"Close him up careful now," the main surgeon ordered. "Good work, everyone."

Being confident enough with his team to know that they could handle a simple close up job and cleaning up, the surgeon exited the operating room, heading to the washing room where he cleaned off the majority of the energon covering him. From there, he went to the operating room where the patient's husband-unit and teenage son and daughter waited. The light glittered on the V-shaped red crest he had on his forehead as he entered the bright waiting room of the hospital. The family jumped to their feet when he walked over to them.

"Is she gonna be okay, Officer Dr. Ratchet?" the husband asked nervously. "Is my wife going to live?"

"Just Dr. Ratchet," Ratchet corrected. "I moved up from a police force paramedic long ago. And don't worry, sir, your wife was merely suffering from uneven energon flow in her body, causing some parts to be weaker than others and that is what caused the collapse when her processor was not receiving a proper flow of energon. But from what I saw, her form of neglected energon flow usually only comes from excess stress. How has her home life been?"

"Oh, Primus," the teenager boy groaned, "Mom and I have been fighting non-stop about me wanting to quite high school for the army. She's had a lot of stress lately and she's been more scared and nervous with the Decepticon attacks on the news and—"

_BONG!!_

"Oww, hey!" the teenager exclaimed, rubbing the large dent he had earned when Ratchet had struck him upside the head. "What was that for?"

The dad and the boy's sister stared on in shock at Ratchet and his actions as he talked. Apparently, while Ratchet had moved out of the police force, he still had the strength and fire for a little violence now and then.

_"That_ was for worrying your mother straight into the operating room," Ratchet scolded, "And what the slag are you thinking, you dumb kid, leaving school for the army? Any stupid mug head with half a processor can join the army, but it takes knowledge to actually go somewhere in it and you get knowledge in school. Now, your mother will be okay to come home with in a week. When she comes home, I want you to be nice for her and keep her stress levels low as best you can so I won't have to see her in my operating room again. And you, young man, _better_ be in school, or you're going to have to talk to a friend of mine in the emergency room!"

Thus speaking, Ratchet shooed the family out of the hospital before going back to clean the remainder of energon off his hands in the washing room. As he did, several nurses and doctors called out a friendly greeting and complimented him on the surgery. A blue and white robot with a face mask and blue high lights came in just as Ratchet was finishing up his cleaning.

"Hi, Ratchet," the surgeon greeted.

"Hello, Scalpel," Ratchet greeted, drying his hands off with a towel. "What can I do for you?"

"I have a question about this guy I have to operate on in three hours," Dr. Scalpel said, following Ratchet out of the washing room and into the long, brightly-lit halls of the Cybertronian hospital they worked at. "He's suffering from rotten wiring in the processor from drinking a bad can of energon that was contaminated by chemical waste products. Now, it should be a simple matter of replacing the segment of corrupted processor board with a fresh, clean board, but the problem is that he has a history of hydraulic acid decomposing nanobots born from mutated clumps of bad energon in his family and I'm worried about accidentally activating the nanobots by installing the new processor board. Do you have any idea how I can cure the patient without making him worse?"

"Yeah, that's easy," Ratchet replied, "What processor board is corrupted?"

"Processor board B36; the bit of the processor that controls inner parts maintenance for transforming sequences and basically keeps his energon break down unit from looking at day light."

"Okay, what you want to do is take a bit of boarding from one of the parts of him that get tucked inside when he's in his alt-form and use fresh stamp and processor board creation supplies to turn that processor into a copy of the corrupted processor, install it the instant the old part is removed, and the processor won't notice the difference, thus not only cutting out the sickness, but minimizing the risks of accidentally activating those nasty nanobots. But be careful, okay? You don't want to accidentally make him think that he's a laser bird or something like that."

"Thanks, Ratchet," Scalpel said as he and Ratchet walked along a hall that had windows looking to the outside to their right. "If anyone's going to bring someone back from the dead, it's you."

"Well, I don't know about curing death," Ratchet chuckled amusingly.

"Yeah, come on!" Scalpel urged. "You're such a great doctor that someday you'll bring someone back from the dead! Ooh, maybe you'll bring a Prime back from the dead?"

"A Prime, as if in major-political-leader-and-only-a-step-down-from-Supreme Prime?" Ratchet asked, "Yeah, right."

Scalpel shrugged, "Worth a shot."

Their conversation was scattered at that moment when an enormous violent explosion rocked the building from somewhere outside, blowing the windows out and knocking the doctors up against the wall.

"What the--!?" Scalpel exclaimed, sitting up.

Ratchet jumped to his feet and leaned out the window to see what was going on. He could see over the roof tops of the surrounding buildings from this height and saw, a block away that some sort of large fight was going on. Large, brawny mechs were locked in combat with smaller Autobot counter parts, apparently doing all they could to keep the Autobots contained and not fighting. Ratchet zoomed in as far as he could with his electronic gaze and spotted the demon-canine insignia of the rebel force tattooed on the more hostile mechs.

"Decepticons are fighting Autobot forces a block away," Ratchet told Scalpel. "The Autobots are going to need help. Care to come with?"

"No," Scalpel replied, climbing shakily to his feet. "I'll do what I can from here."

"Suit your self," Ratchet replied, turning into his emergency vehicle form. "See you later!"

Ratchet sped away, maneuvering his way to the elevator and down to the ground floor where people were in mass panic. People were streaming into the hospital with an all manner and variation of wounds, frantically calling out for help. Ratchet stopped only momentarily in the supplies office to pick up a field medic kit, loading it into his back trunk area before once more resuming vehicle mode and speeding out of the hospital. Less than a minute of driving later and Ratchet was on the street where the mass of the fighting was going on. He saw plenty of mechs fighting, but ignored them as he scanned the rubble-strewn street that was quickly being destroyed. Suddenly, his scanners picked up a couple of mechs hidden in an already-ruined building and sped over to them. In the building, he saw an Autobot guarding his injured friend, who appeared to be suffering a nasty case of missing limb; his right leg, to be exact. The soldiers looked up as Ratchet sped into their building and transformed.

"It's okay," he promised, drawing out his tool kit. "I'm here to help. Let me at that leg…"

"You're a doctor?" one of the soldiers asked as Ratchet began to weld the energon-bleeding tubes shut on the patient's missing limb.

"Dr. Ratchet," Ratchet introduced, "I work at the hospital around the corner and came when I saw the fight."

They ducked when a stray laser shot flew by over head, crashing into the far wall and vaporizing a section there.

"Hey!" Ratchet yelled, turning to yell at the street, "I'm working here!" Turning back, he asked his patient, "So, how did this happen?"

"I was jumping over a land mine a Decepticon put down when it went off," the patient replied.

_BONG!!!_

"Oww! What was that for?" the patient whined, rubbing the fresh dent in his head.

"_Jumping_ over a _land mine_?" Ratchet demanded, "Are you stupid or something?" He tapped one of his tools on the patient's head to add emphasis to "stupid".

"And I thought you were on our side," the patient pouted.

A Decepticon appeared behind Ratchet, pointing his gun at the doctor's head.

"Put your hands up!" the Decepticon ordered.

Ratchet spotted the legless soldier's gun resting by the soldier's hand. Remembering his time on the police force, Ratchet grabbed the gun, turned, and shot the Decepticon. He had returned the gun and was back to repairing the mech even before the Decepticon had hit the ground.

"Well," the guarding soldier muttered, shooting a look at the patient, "I'm glad that he's on _our_ side."

For the next hour of fighting, Ratchet did what he did best: He saved lives through medical action. When one mech was battle-worthy once more, or at least not in danger of dying immediately, he moved on to the next injured mech he detected, or to who ever shouted for a medic first. He was unbothered by the violence or all the body energon; the fighting he just shrugged off and he had seen worse from major air liner accidents than what he repaired that day on the battlefield. The worse part about it was that the Decepticons had a nasty habit of shooting at him.

To these Decepticons, he often responded by throwing a wrench right at their heads, either knocking them out or giving them a very large pain between the optics. Sometimes, he even threw a wrench just to help out and for the fun of it; there was something funny in the way the Decepticons froze and their heads snapped back, chins to the sky, when the wrench hit them in just the right way. Other times, he would snatch a gun from a soldier, dead or alive, and express his old officer skills by shooting at a Decepticon. The fighting ended soon enough and Ratchet was adding the final bandaging weld touches on the major leg wound of a 'bot when the Decepticons fled.

Ratchet looked up briefly to watch the Decepticons fly away then looked back down at his job, simply commenting, "Finally."

"You're good," his patient said, flexing their leg when Ratchet was completed.

"I would hope so," Ratchet replied, helping the mech to his feet. "I'm Dr. Ratchet; I work as a major surgeon at the hospital just around the corner from here."

"Prowl," the other mech said, shaking Ratchet's hand, "You know, we can really use your help on the battlefield. We're short in supply of proper medics and would really like to know that our lives are in good hands."

"You want _me_ to join the army?" Ratchet asked, tickled by the concept. "Now that's just ironic, considering I tell most teen-bots I treat for busted internal frames that if they want to do stuff on the same stupidity as jumping off roofs that they should just join the army."

"You wouldn't be the first ironic recruitment," Prowl replied, shrugging helplessly. "But we can seriously do well with your help."

"I think I'll just stick to the hospital and help the people there," Ratchet replied. "Speaking of which, I have to go back there and help with the chaos happening there."

Thus speaking, Ratchet turned and left for the hospital. Later, as he and Scalpel did surgery on a femme's internal injuries, attended by a slue of other doctors and nurses, Ratchet told Scalpel of the offer.

"And you said no?" Scalpel asked.

"Well, yeah," Ratchet replied. "If those slagger are going to waste their time shooting each other up, then that's their decision! I'm certainly not going to fix them up if they run into the wall."

"But Ratchet," one of the nurses said, "Don't you want to do anything for your community?"

"I'm doing that now: Fixing up busted bots!" Ratchet said, waving around his energon-covered tools.

"Ah ah," Scalpel suddenly said, making everyone go silent. When Scalpel said "ah ah", it was bad news.

"What is it," Scalpel?" Ratchet asked, turning to his comrade.

"This femme was expecting," Scalpel said.

Sure enough, amidst the cut energon and coolant tubes and cracked and shattered inner components, a tiny screen flashing inner data expressed the proper numerical data saying that the femme was developing a Sparkling inside her own Spark.

"Can we save it?" Ratchet asked.

"I don't think so," Scalpel sighed sadly. "See? The numbers are getting jumbled. The trauma ruined it. All we can do is clear it out before it causes an infection. Poor femme is going to be Spark-broken when she wakes up. Primus, that's no way to loose a kid…"

Ratchet was quiet through out the rest of the surgery. When ever anyone wanted to talk to him, they had only to look at the hard look in his optics and know that he was not in the mood. Several hours later, Ratchet took longer than usual in the washer room as he slowly cleaned his hands and Scalpel went out to give the news to the femme's friends. When Scalpel came back, Ratchet was sitting on a bench, staring at the large, round sink in the washer room.

"Ratchet?" Scalpel said quietly. "I know you wanted to save the Sparkling, but we couldn't. It was too late before she even got to us—"

"I'm going to do it," Ratchet interrupted. "Those slagging Decepticons have no right to take lives before they have even started. I'm going to the Autobot Army recruitment center tonight and signing in as a medic and warrior."

Scalpel's optics widened in surprise, then smiled as he nodded.

"It was a pleasure working with you, Ratchet."

"And you too, Scalpel," Ratchet said, standing and shaking Scalpel's hand. "If you need anything, feel free to call me."

"It's going to be difficult, with you in the army and all," Scalpel chuckled. "I would _pay_ to see the reaction of every person you've ever hit if they saw you now."

"Don't make me hit you too, Scalpel," Ratchet mock-scolded.

"Ah, go ahead," Scalpel said. "You know you wanna—"

_BONG!!_

"Oww! Not so hard!" Scalpel whined, rubbing his new head dent.

"You asked for it!" Ratchet laughed as he exited the room on his way to write his letter of resignation from the hospital. "Wish me luck, Scalpel!"

"Good luck, Ratchet the Hatchet!"

Ratchet didn't let Scalpel see it, but he smiled at the name the interns had been calling him for years. Hopefully, he would be bringing the same reputation to the Autobot army…

**Author's Note: Feel free to request an origin not displayed in the original G1 series. **


	16. Wheeljack

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers and the author claims no rights to them.**

**Chapter 16: Wheeljack**

It was a respectable club hidden in the deepest part of the forest of rock crystals possible. It took many Transformers hours to find while on the ground, and it was near impossible to find from above because the top of the cup cake-shaped club was topped with rock protrusions identical to the rest. Here, members of the Proper Traders Guild could meet and live, showing off their exotic pets and Cassetticons and brag about their latest economic feats while nibbling and sipping on the finest brands of energon credit could buy. One could almost forget that there was a civil war between Autobots and Decepticons going on in the outside world, and, indeed, it appeared at time that some of the guild members had actually become Decepticons, depending on the sudden appearance of weapons and their flow of credits.

But his job was to deliver the meals, not eaves drop on them, or so Wheeljack was told.

Wheeljack balanced the trays of plates on his broad shoulder as he set them in front of their customers at the long table this particular party sat at. Around them, the royal blue plush-covered floor was lit by the lights hanging from the black ceiling over head. Numerous other round table of varying size were scattered here and there a respectable distance from the party's table, allowing other guild members to eat in privacy with a view of the enormous rock spikes outside. Every now and then, the hub bub of conversation was drowned out as the loud, clattering bustle of the kitchen came from the side. Over head, other club comers talked in the Relaxation Loft while in the sub-ground floors, numerous polishing, sports, activity, and hotel rooms were occupied by other club comers. Especially elite members could stay here all year around, right along with the butlers and servants like Wheeljack.

"It was just ghastly, I tell you, simply ghastly!" one gem-studded femme exclaimed as Wheeljack placed her oil and gas soup in front of her. "Fire was all over the place and those Decepticon _brutes_ were shooting everything in sight! That was when I called it for my husband, packed up all our precious items, and came here to keep away from all that _vile_ activity!"

"Don't forget that he guy next to you is a Decepticon," Wheeljack pointed out, glancing at the red and black mech beside the femme.

The femme looked at the other, amusingly-smirking mech beside her, spotted the Decepticon insignia, and looked away as a blush crept into her face and she quickly sipped at her soup.

Wheeljack finished serving the items and made his way back to the kitchen, but was pulled over by a fellow black and white butler-bot.

"Wheeljack," the butler scolded, "What have I told you about speaking?"

"To not do it until I'm spoken to, I know, I know, Crochet," Wheeljack replied. "But come on, that femme was going to get a gun to her head if she wasn't told."

"Weapons are not allowed in the _Rock Pinnacle Castle,_" Crochet hissed.

"Do you _really_ think Decepticons will follow that?"

"Just keep your audio maker mute before I am forced to report you to the club head for inapproprieate actions. And polish yourself up this week! You're not glistening properly!"

Wheeljack rolled his optics and began to move on to the kitchen, but Crotchet added, "And find a way of getting your face fixed; that face mask and those ear fins are _embarrassing_ to look at!"

"Don't forget that I can keep more orders straight than you ever can, Crotchet," Wheeljack muttered, "Not to mention that I can deliver quicker than you without dropping any."

Inside the kitchen, the stainless steel equipment was being attended to by chefs with uniform white paint jobs that prepared the food for their customers as quickly as possible. Wheeljack waited at the counter splitting the kitchen entrance from the rest of the kitchen, ready to pick up the next batch of trays to deliver. He glanced to his left at a wall-length mirror and caught his image in it.

Tall and slim, Wheeljack had the usual black-on-white paintjob as the other butlers of the _Rock Pinnacle Castle_. He always hated that paintjob; it was so dull and just _informal_ on him. It was required of the butlers to stay polished enough to see reflections in their armor, but Wheeljack had been procrastinating with such a task and his armor was starting to become a little dull in the sheen department. At least one thing kept him unique: His large nose over his face mask, and his large ear fin lights. Everyone complained that his head was a ridiculous mockery of the class the club was supposed to show, but Wheeljack was too good of a butler to be simply fired.

More food trays made it to the counter at that moment and Wheeljack took them across his arms and made his way out of the kitchen once more, quickly going over to the party table to deliver them. As he set the trays down in front of the mechs who ordered them, he saw that one of the femmes' Sparkling was crying for attention. The mother was trying to shush the embarrassing cries, but to no avail.

"Hey, squirt, what's the matter?" Wheeljack asked, kneeling besides the Sparkling.

Before the Sparkling could give him an answer he could not act to, he made himself emit several beep sounds, making either of his ear fins flash in corresponding to the beeps. The Sparkling boy laughed at this and Wheeljack emitted a playful tune of beeps, making his ear fins blink in a rapid fashion to it. The Sparkling laughed and tugged at one of Wheeljack's fins. The mother smiled gratefully to Wheeljack as he stood and patted the Sparkling on the head.

"Wheeljack!" Crotchet yelled from the kitchen.

Rolling his optics, Wheeljack went over to the head butler.

"What?" Wheeljack sighed.

"You're on trash duty tonight," Crotchet snapped, shoving a bag into Wheeljack's hand.

Wheeljack rolled his optics, but obediently took the bag out back where a furnace was. He tossed the trash inside and watched as the dark chamber with in flashed red before completely vaporizing the trash. When the bin was full with ash, the bin would be taken away to be emptied somewhere. Wheeljack dropped the lid of the trash can, brushing his hands off, and looked up at the starry night sky. A dark shape swooped by in the sky and Wheeljack tilted his head curiously. He made his ear fins glow brightly in an attempt to eliminate the sky object. He saw the form of a large, dark hawk-bot, but as soon as he spotted it, the bird swooped away, disappearing over the peaks of the rock spikes.

"Yeagh, creepy," he muttered, going back into the resteraunte.

He entered through the back door and into a long, narrow rear hall. On the left, there was the entrance to the supplies and storage room. To his right, there was the entrance to the large and bustling kitchen. Everything was colored with a fancy, in-taste rich royal blue to match the rest of the _Rock Pinnacle Castle_. Wheeljack heard dishes crashing out front and went straight ahead to the doorway at the other end of the hall that would bring him to the main lobby and resteraunt area, preparing to help the waiters there clean up whatever mess they made.

When he opened the door, he saw everyone looking to the door, confused, terrified, and a little insulted. In the door way stood a tall, hansom, dark blue and white mech with a couple of identical Cassetticons in front of him and a large black feline-bot at his side with a black and yellow bird perched on his shoulder, the other shoulder being occupied by a shoulder cannon.

Wheeljack had to admit that this crew looked bad aft.

"Do you have an _invitation_, Mr. Soundwave?" Crotchet sneered to the large mech.

"Invitation: Unnecessary," Soundwave replied. "Location: Property of Lord Megatron and the Decepticons."

"What is the meaning of this? Get out!" Crotchet shrieked.

"After you, polish can head!" the lavender Cassetticon laughed, shooting at Crotchet.

Crotchet cried out and flung himself aside and into the kitchen. The shot missed him and headed for Wheeljack. Wheeljack ducked and darted fro the kitchen as the guests fell into a screaming panic. In the kitchen, the chefs looked up with confused optics and stared at Crotchet as he hid himself under a sink.

"What is going on out there, Wheeljack?" one of the chefs asked.

"We're getting attacked by Decepticons!" Wheeljack exclaimed. "Bonita, toss me your strainer. Calypso, get the bolts from the oven. Cross Hanger, a length of spare tubing and wires from the storage room, and any screws, nails, and bolts you can find, will you? Oh, and the spice powder dispencer. Move, everyone!"

"W-w-w-w-w-w-w-w-what are y-y-y-y-y-you d-d-d-d-_doing_, W-w-w-w-w-Wheeljack?" Crotchet stammered as the items were brought to him and Wheeljack began to put them together with a fuser in his finger.

"I'm an inventor, remember?" Wheeljack reminded.

"Oh, great," one of the chefs groaned. "If it'll turn out anything like the Primus Day light show…"

"Or the new armor polisher," another chef said.

"Or the gun cleaner at the hunting party," said another.

"Or the energon processor,"

"Or the Cassetticon polisher—"

"I get it! I get it! If it turns out like any of that stuff, it'll go boom, I know, I know," Wheeljack assured. "But in this case, it wouldn't be too bad if it _did_ go boom, as long as it went boom on those Decepticons out there, right?"

"I suppose," a chef muttered.

"And don't forget the improved brake system I made! Or the light system that spent three times less energy than before! Come on, I'm a guy whose ideas work three times out of ten, gimmie a break, that's why I'm here to pay off my mechanics school fees."

"Didn't you get kicked out?"

"Okay, so I _might_ have been, uh, _removed_ for a few months or so, but I'm still in it! So that's gotta say something, right?"

"What did you _do_ in those months out of school?" a femme asked.

"Got it!" Wheeljack said, holding up his invention.

It was a long, slim sort of gun, complete with a clasp to connect to one's shoulder. It had just been made, but so professionally that one would have thought it had been made in a genuine factory. Looking at it, the chefs had to admit that it was surprising how Wheeljack had made such a device out of so much trash and they couldn't even tell the difference.

"What _is_ it?" someone asked.

"It's an all-ammo launch gun!" Wheeljack said, holding the large device up. "If it does what it's supposed to, it can shoot just about anything I put on its muzzle. Now, for a test! Cross Hangar, did you get those bolts and stuff I asked for?"

"Right here, Wheeljack," the mech said, plopping an iron mesh bag of small hardware on the table in front of Wheeljack.

"Perfect, thanks," Wheeljack said, slinging the bag across his chest. "Let's go see how this baby works! Who wants to come with?"

Everyone ran back to hide behind the counters and tables.

"Suite yourself," Wheeljack said with a shrug.

Exiting the kitchen, Wheeljack saw that most of the diners were running about in a mad panic or were even lying, smoking and grey, on the floor. The squad of Decepticons that had entered originally were now accompanied by a larger force of Decepticons that were looting and-or killing the diners of the _Rocky Pinnacle Castle_. Wheeljack ducked behind an over turned table, loaded a bolt into his invention, and carefully aimed at a Decepticon standing apart from his comrades. Wheeljack aimed carefully before he pulled the trigger.

With a quiet twang noise, the bolt zipped through the air, almost invisible to the naked optic, and struck the Decepticon straight in the back of the neck. They went down without a sound.

With a satisfied hum, Wheeljack loaded a screw into the gun and repeated the procedure with another Decepticon. This time, the Decepticon called Soundwave noticed.

"Resistance: Futile," Soundwave droned as he marched over to Wheeljack.

"Yeah, but ya can't keep me from trying, can ya?" Wheeljack asked, standing and shooting at Soundwave.

The bolt bit deep into Soundwave and even made him jerk his head back, but the warrior shook his head as a low, quiet rumble came from deep in him.

"Oh slag," Wheeljack squeaked.

"Ravage: Attack," Soundwave ordered.

The panther bot snarled eagerly as it bounded out from behind Soundwave and leaped up at Wheeljack. Wheeljack swung his gun, striking Ravage clear in the side. He bolted away, jumping up onto a table and leaping from table to table to the shattered windows of the resteraunt. Decepticons attempted to take him down as he ran, but Wheeljack managed to load his gun and shoot them down. Upon reaching the windows, he leaped out to the dirt parking lot beyond, falling into his Cybertronian van form. His gun remained attached to his hood and he sped around the Decepticons that chased him outside, going down the narrow, winding road that led away from the club.

_Gotta get help!_ Wheeljack thought. _There's an Autobot base at the end of this trail. I'll get help there!_

Most mechs would be unable to maneuver the sharp curves of the road at anything faster than a couple dozen miles an hour. Not Wheeljack; with precise, controlled, almost professional turns, he skid around the curves at top speed without so much as tapping the walls of enormous rock protrusions on either side of him. Decepticons followed him both in the air and on the ground, but they crashed into the walls and only the most skilled kept pursuit. Among the Decepticons in the air was Soundwave.

"You drive well," Soundwave commented. "Inquiry: Source of skills?"

"Uh, you pick some up from… around," Wheeljack replied nervously.

He transformed long enough to load and shoot his invention at one of the Decepticons, knocking them into the rock spires. He loaded it again, cramming in four additional bolts, before clasping it on his shoulder, transforming and taking off again.

"I have accessed your files—"Soundwave began.

"Hey, get out of those! Those are private!"

"You were in jail for destruction of property?"

"Okay, so the mechanics college I'm at kind of got ticked when I blew their entire fuel research branch sky-high after a mishap, so? Hey, the guys on the inside-- er, in _the correction facility_ were pretty cool when I fixed them up a bit and even made a few, small, temporary items. They taught me how to fight, shoot, and drive."

"You are very skilled. Proposition: Join the Decepticons, and your life will be spared."

Hmm, interesting proposition. But Wheeljack was an inventor, not an entrepenuer for bigger and better thing. Besides, these guys had just tried killing him minutes ago. He wouldn't trust anyone who tired to _kill_ him. Wheeljack spotted light up ahead and sped up.

"No way!" he exclaimed.

Suddenly, they were in the open outside of the rocky spike forest. A military out post was in front of Wheeljack and the Autobots instantly went into action against the Decepticons. Laser fire filled the air and Wheeljack had just barely enough space to transform, rolling onto his back, and skidded along on his back as he shot rapidly into the sky with his invention. He came to a halt and a Decepticon wasted no time in landed standing over him with their feet planted on either side of him. Wheeljack was out of bolts on his gun with no time to load it again.

"Wires, activate, wires, activate," Wheeljack muttered.

Obeying the voice command, wires sprouted from the shoulder clasp of the gun, going into Wheeljack to hook up to his energy circuits. Energy flushed into his gun and he could barely control it as a stream of glowing purple laser light burst from the gun and sprayed up into the air, not only hitting his direct foe in the face, but flailing through out the air and knocking Decepticons down left and right. Some of the Autobots even had to hit the ground to avoid being hit.

"Decepticons: Retreat," Soundwave ordered.

All Decepticons alive enough to do so took off back into the black night sky, leaving the Autobots and Wheeljack alone. Wheeljack clenched his energy circuits up as tight as he could until the energy ebbed and faded from his gun, making him a safe thing to be around again. He got to his feet, squeezing at the gun's clasp to try and get it off.

"What's going on up there?" an Autobot exclaimed, running over to Wheeljack.

"Decepticons are attacking the _Rock Pinnacle Castle_ and need help something bad!" Wheeljack said, fiddling with his invention.

"Are you okay?" the Autobot asked.

"Yeah, yeah, I'm fine," Wheeljack assured, watching a troop of Autobots run on up the path. "This thing just won't get off. Hey, what are the benefits of joining the Autobot army in the way of legal rights?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, do they get certain, say, legal rights over explosive experimentation? I'm an inventor, you see, and my inventions work, but they just tend to, eh heh, back fire. Or just all around screw up, like this gun thing on my shoulder, which _will not let go_!"

He smacked the gun in frustration and it suddenly spun around, shooting energy into the air wildly. Everybody ducked again until Wheeljack had gained control of the wild invention.

"Ah," the Autobot said slowly, clearly not really understanding.

Wheeljack sighed and rolled his optics as he pulled the barrel of his shoulder gun down to point at the ground.

"Look, you see this?" he said, indicating the gun. "I made this less than half an hour ago with _kitchen scrap,_ and it took out at _least_ five Decepticons all on its own. Now, imagine if I could get some _real_ material and make weapons for the Autobots."

"I see," the Autobot soldier said, really meaning it this time. "And what would be the price of your joining the Autobot cause?"

"Uh, I got some _black marks_ on my record that I'd rather not have any evidence of," Wheeljack said. He rubbed the back of his neck and looked away, slightly embarassed and ashamed at the same time. "Nothing serious, but still…"

"I'll see what I can do. But if I may ask…"

"Wheeljack."

"But if I may ask, Wheeljack: Why join the Autobots now?"

"Well, when the bad guys show up at your home shooting stuff and taking names, it's time to choose a side," Wheeljack responded. "And plus..." He tapped his shoulder invention. "If I got this thing stuck on my shoulder forever, I might as well use it for _something_."

**Author's Note: Any origins not explained in the Transformers G1 series may be requested for showing in this fiction.**

**Coming up on Transformers: Origins, it's everybody's favorite yellow Buggy, Bumblebee. Followed by our old pal, Ironhide, and then perhaps the Insecticons, after which will be the Autobot Cosmos.**


	17. Bumblebee

**Disclaimer: I do not own Transformers. Hasbro and other attached companies own Transformers.**

**Chapter 17: Bumblebee**

Bumblebee hummed a random tune as he roamed around the energon break room of the store he worked at. Looking over on another wall, he spotted a chart and smiled. The electronic hologram chart was a constantly updated chart of who had sold the most electronics in the store and Bumblebee was very satisfied to see that his bar was significantly higher than the others.

"Man, how do you do it, Bee?" one of Bumblebee's co-workers asked as he entered the room. "The other guys and I work our tail pipes off just to get one item sold and you just seem to pass them from customer to customer!"

"I dunno, Rashrunner, but I'm glad I can," Bumblebee told his friend.

Rashrunner; an ugly name that did not suit the red and blue robot friend of Bumblebee's, but he was what he was.

"Maybe it's because you're so short and they think that you'll use your wages to get a height extending surgery?" Rashrunner laughed, elbowing Bumblebee gently in the side.

"Hey," Bumblebee laughed, shoving Rashrunner back gently. "That's not nice!"

"And neither are your numbers," Rashrunner bantered back.

"Hey, at least you get _ladies_ numbers; that's more important than any numbers recording how many items you've sold."

"Then why do you practically _glow_ when ever the boss announces that you're the employee of the month?"

"What, I like praise, okay?"

"Yeah, yeah, come on; lunch break's almost over," Rashrunner said, leading he way out of the break room. "By the way, what do you think of those rebel skirmishes that have been springing up all over the place?"

They exited a small hall and came into the main store's room where numerous customers browsed the numerous child toys and were tended to by an occasional sales man like Rashrunner and Bumblebee.

"Truth to tell," Bumblebee replied, "I hope they don't come here."

"Danger, coming around here?" Rashrunner snorted, "Please, Bee, this is a _toy store_. Put us in at least a _parts _department and _then_ I _might_ be concerned. Oh, situation in aisle six, and she's got a sweet _booty_. See you after work for Byte's celebration party after finally tying the knot with Crystal?"

"Sure, see you there," Bee replied before separating for his own corner of the store.

This was Bumblebee's life; a sweet-mannered bachelor, his talent with Sparklings helped him in his career as a toy store salesman. His zeal for compliments and approval had also helped him be the employee of the month numerous times in a row. He was pleasant, nice, and sometimes shy, but he tended to be a nice guy to hang around. He expressed this now as he approached a mother who appeared to be trying to quiet down her little son as best she could before he exploded into a bawling fit.

"Hey, sport," Bumblebee said, going straight for the boy as he knelt on the floor to be optic-level with the little green lad. "What's the matter? Why the long face?"

The red-painted mother looked at Bumblebee suspiciously, but saw his name tag magnetically attached to his chest and settled down somewhat. The Sparkling, still silver and bland with youth before the Morphing years, sniffled before answering Bumblebee.

"M-M-M-M-Momma won't get me the toy I want," he sobbed.

"Oh and why's that?" Bumblebee asked.

"S-She said it's too expensive."

"Which toy is it?"

The little bot pointed out the wanted toy and Bumblebee took it off the shelf and looked it over. It was a pet drone; a mere toy of an actual pet and could run until the batteries went dead. Indeed, it was an expensive toy, but it could last a long time if handled properly. Bumblebee remembered having a drone pet of his own when he was a little bot and knew how much fun the lad would have with it, even if it hardly lasted at all.

Suddenly, someone knocked something over in another aisle with a loud crash, making the mother and son turn away curiously. Instantly Bumblebee's fingers skillfully broke the seal on the box.

"Oh, well, will you look at that," Bumblebee said, drawing the mother and child's attention back to him. "Someone's already messed with this one; the price should only be half now."

He stood and handed the toy to the mother, winking slyly.

"Store policy, you know," he said.

The mother smiled gratefully back at him as she replied, "Indeed. Come on, Junior, let's check out."

"Thank you!" the Sparkling exclaimed.

"Treat it well now," Bumblebee said cheerfully as the son bounced happily after his mother as she walked away.

"Sucker," Rashrunner chuckled, appearing behind Bumblebee. "You are _such_ a corner cutter."

Rashrunner wasn't serious; the salesmen cut corners all the time by handing out discounts, repairing toys for free, even giving out a toy here and there, mostly to attract a certain attractive single parents and the like. Bumblebee was a rare exception that was a child enough in his Spark to let an occasional toy get an unauthorized discount so a child could take it home.

"Oh, come on," Bumblebee defended playfully, "The kid will love it!"

Rashrunner laughed and Bumblebee chuckled, but a sudden low rumble outside made them fall silent. The entire store fell silent as everyone turned to the large windows making the front of the store. After a long moment where no more strange sound came, activity resumed. The mother and the boy who Bumblebee had helped left soon after with a female friend of the mother's. As they left, Bumblebee caught a bit of their conversation.

"…Leave town," the mother was whispering, "My husband's uncle's family is in the military and are stocked for war…"

Then the door shut behind her, cutting off her conversation from Bumblebee. Bumblebee shivered nervously. The rebellions, the Decepticons, would be put down before the end of the month, the Prime Magnus had said. But what Bumblebee had been seeing on the news claimed otherwise. Already there were reports of the Decepticons taking over minor military bases and killing dozens of soldiers there. There was even one or two reports of an entire cities being slaughtered in the Decepticons' quest to gain ground. With the main headquarters in Cyberopolis in ruin, the Autobots were barely organized to function and military forces weren't getting out fast enough to counteract the Decepticons. No one had been prepared for war except the Decepticons.

Bumblebee supposed that he should have something planned, but he was confident that should the rebels ever pour into his regular town, he would just follow what ever instructions were broadcasted on the news waves and he would be fine. After all, he was just a short, cheery yellow mech that worked at a toy store. What could the Decepticons _possibly_ want from him other than a hostage situation?

Confident with this idea, Bumblebee went about with his regular job, humming cheerfully and being his usual friendly self. An hour later, there was a lull in customers and most of the salesmen went outside to enjoy the warm day outside. A few others stayed in to restock the shelves and Bumblebee joined them. He brought a stack of boxes to the front of the store between the shelves and the large glass windows and set them down, humming a cheerful tune to himself.

At that moment, an ominous rumble sounded out, making everything in the store vibrate with some shockwaves. Bumblebee froze, his hum falling silent as his content smile disappeared. He knelt on the floor like that for another moment, frozen by some internal clock waiting for something more to happen.

Then all of Pit broke loose.

A brief shriek was all Bumblebee heard before the windows exploded as something plunged through them and crashed into the back of the store. An explosion ripped through the store, knocking toys off their shelves and shoving Bumblebee into the wall underneath the store windows.

Bumblebee grunted at the impact and a flood of noises filled his audio receptors: Fire alarms, crackling flames, tinkling glass, panicked screams, the numerous beeps and whistles of activated toys and a strange roar outside in the sky. It was something he could not identify with now, but in the coming years, Bumblebee would come to recognize not only that roar as the battle call of in-coming Decepticon jets, but he would be able to identify those jets by name from the tone of their engines alone.

But for now, all he experienced confusion. What was happening? Why was it happening? Who would attack a _toy_ store?

Breathing heavily in fear, Bumblebee began to sit up, preparing to get up and go see what was happening. But an explosion sounded out next door and laser fire screeched through the air, causing more explosions. Three stray streaks of red light plunged through the shattered window, vaporizing top-shelf toys and knocking some over. Screaming in fear, Bumblebee curled up and transformed into a typical Cybertronian hover car form. Rather than hover in the air as it was supposed to, Bumblebee clunked to the floor and remained there, curling in as close as he could into himself. He shivered and whimpered with his optic sensors turned off in terror, as the battle grew and raged outside.

He heard the sound of passing by Transformers in vehicle form, heard laser fire rain on them and people transforming, only to scream and fall to the ground in a crash of metal, slain by their enemies. Many more explosions and hissing laser fire sounded out, but what was worse was the cackle of the attackers; these mechs, who ever they were, were _killing_ people and _laughing_ about it! What sort of monsters would do such a thing??

Bumblebee didn't know when the other side arrived, but when it did, more laser fire sounded out and the laughing attackers had their turn at screaming in pain and anguish as the defenders fought them. Bumblebee whimpered and suppressed the urge to cry like a little child in fear, lest he accidentally attract unwanted attention. All the while, he prayed incoherently to Primus to protect him.

Bumblebee must have passed out or gone to a safer place in his mind without knowing it because one minute the battle was raging on outside and the next, it was deadly silent. All he could hear were flames crackling. After a long moment, Bumblebee slowly transformed in to robot form. He crouched on the floor amidst the knocked over toys and windows' shattered glass on his hands and knees, waiting for someone to follow the sound of his transformation and confront him. When he heard approaching feet, he stiffened in terror, unable to even transform, and looked up at the broken windows, shivering slightly as he waited for his fate to come to him.

Metal feet crunched over glass and rock and a silhouette appeared in the window. Upon seeing him, the robot silhouette turned away briefly.

"Hey!" he shouted, "We have a survivor here!"

There were some ordering shouts outside as the robot turned back to Bumblebee and reached in. Bumblebee saw a red Autobot insignia flash on the robot's arm and let loose a breath he had been holding.

"Come on, you lucky slagger," the soldier said, gently taking Bumblebee's arm in hand and pulling him to his shaky feet. "We gotta move before the Decepticons come back."

Bumblebee accepted the help out of the window completely bypassing the door, but what he saw outside made him lean heavily on the assisting Autobot soldier for support.

The street the toy store was on, the street that Bumblebee had passed up and down his entire life _was gone_. All the buildings he had been able to recognize by name alone were either in ruins or trashed. Rubble covered the streets and streams of energon were running here and there. But what was worse than these material damages were the bodies; dozens of grey bodies lay all over the place, some appearing to have died fighting while others were frozen in a curled up position in a vain attempt at defense. Slowly, Bumblebee turned around, horrified at the carnage and yet, too awed to take his optics off of it.

On the sidewalk to his and his rescuing soldiers' left, he spotted a heap of bodies, sitting clumsily against the wall of the toy store like so many dolls. But the life-sized, grey metal figures and the streaks of energon staining the wall behind them showed how mercilessly these macabre doll set had been created: They had been standing, idly chatting, before they had been shot before they even saw something wrong. A distance between Bumblebee and his fellow co-workers' dead bodies was a familiar body stretched out, as if making a run for it before he had been cut down. When Bumblebee saw the familiar face, the one that had been teasing him about his zeal for praise just a few hours before, he looked away.

"Rashrunner…" he whispered.

"Come on, sir," the soldier bade Bumblebee, "We have to get out of the open. I know it's a bit grim, but I'm afraid that we'll all have to get used to it before the year is out. War is here and there is no slagging way that it'll be over before the month. What's your name, sir?"

"Bumblebee," Bumblebee replied, looking back up at the carnage. He looked at all the good memories and people that had been so mercilessly been cut down. He looked at the _insult_ that the Decepticons had bestowed upon the innocent, decent folk. The insult was that the Decepticons were able to wipe such timeless, happy memories out in mere seconds just because they _could_. He didn't even know what he was thinking until he spoke.

"And I want to join the Autobot army to keep those-those-those Decepti-_creeps_ from doing this again."

To this, the soldier laughed, "Decepti-creeps? I like that! Alright, Bumblebee, my name's Bluestreak. People say I swear a blue streak, but I still have no idea what they mean by that. I think it has to do with how I talk a lot. So I like to keep a conversation going, is that so bad? Oh, what am I doing? You're scared and terrified out of your mind. Come on and we'll get you in the army with my squad leader, a fine fellah called Prowl. He's a bit of a prick, but he's nice, actually…"

**AN: Any Transformer origins not explained in the G1 cartoon series may be requested at any time.**


	18. Ironhide

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers. I claim no owner ship over them.**

**Chapter 18: Ironhide**

Three empty energon cans were lined up on the shelf of a window of a boarded up building. A simple, old, cheap disk-launching device was set to the side and numerous other targets, mostly cans picked up from around, were lined up and balanced all about the courtyard. A small robotic feline with four eyes sat on a trash can, bathing itself.

Suddenly, he drew his gun and in quick succession, shot the three energon cans out. The feline jumped at the sudden hiss of laser fire in the air. Activated by sound, the disk-launch device shot four disks into the air in rapid succession. Three shots rang out, one taking out two disks at once, and the feline leaped down from its can. It had not even hit the ground before the shooter took out the cans that had been balanced behind it. By the time the feline bounded out of the courtyard and into hiding three seconds later, ten more targets had been taken out with one shot. The shooter stood in the center of the courtyard, one hand on his hip while the other held up his smoking laser rifle by his proudly grinning face.

He was a mech of simple design: Red, blocky, and with a simple helmet with silver-grey face plate features and accenting. He appeared middle aged for a Transformer. But at this time of day, didn't he have work? Or was this his day off? Now that one thought about it, it _was _unusually quiet for a city.

The mech blew on the end of his old gun to cool it and holstered it before exiting the courtyard. Out in the open street, it was like a ghost town: What few mechs dared roam the street did so only briefly. They exited a building and looked around fearfully before shuffling or even all-out sprinting to another building. Some people were even shuttering or boarding up their windows. But the gun-slinging mech only smiled easily as he strode tall, proud, and in the open down the sidewalk and to one of the apartment buildings. In the lobby of the building, the large family from the floor above him was turning in their card keys to the building manager. The father-unit did the necessary form work while the mother tried to keep her Sparklings, still silver and bland with youth, in line. Only two of the Sparklings were showing different traits and gaining colors in the midst of their Morphing years and were busy pretending to watch over their luggage.

"But why are we going away, momma?" one child whined. "I don't wanna go!"

"Because it's not safe, sweetie," the mother-unit replied. "There—there are bad people coming to hurt us. We have to go some place safe, my little cup of energon—"

The mother set her hand against one of the stacked up suitcases, as if to find firm footing in the turmoil of her life. All she managed to do was knock it over. The gun mech quickly caught the suitcase before it hit the floor and set it back in its place. The mother-unit gave him a grateful smile.

"Thank you, Ironhide," she sighed. "I don't know what we're going to do without you. You were _so_ good with the teen-bots."

"Any time, miss," he replied. "And as for taking care of the teens," He grinned as he shook one of the Morphing-yearlings' heads playfully. "Just give 'em a good kicking now and then and they'll stay in line."

"Are you sure you don't want to come with us, 'Hide?" the Morphing-yearling asked. "I hear that Kyron 5 has _really _loose gun laws."

"Kiddo," Ironhide said, patting his gun meaningfully, "Gun laws are loose _everywhere_ now a- days."

"Okay, we're ready," the father-unit announced, picking up some of the luggage.

Ironhide followed the family out of the building as they all took up their luggage and went out to the street. The parents and older children transformed quickly enough, tucking their luggage with in their alt-modes as they changed. They let the little ones board into them. Ironhide was his usual friendly self on the outside, but inside, he felt a lump growing in his throat. He had helped this family on more than one night: Baby-sitting, fixing things, disciplining the Morphing-yearlings when they got out of line, finding the Sparklings when they went missing in the big city, and had even been there for a couple of their births.

Now they were fleeing to Kyron 5, like most people now-a-days, as if going to another planet would make the war go away. A part of Ironhide knew that the Decepticons would come to take Kyron 5 someday, just like the asteroid towns they had conquered, and he wanted to follow the family to protect them. But he knew that he should stay out where the danger was in a better chance of doing more damage to the Decepticons.

"Good bye, Ironhide," the father-unit said sadly. "We will never forget you."

"You just keep those kids straight and true, you hear?" Ironhide said, disguising his nervousness and sadness.

The Sparklings called farewells to Ironhide as their parents drove off, leaving Ironhide to stand on the side of the road and watch them go.

- - - -

When the sun set, the city became even more quiet and the ominous aura reached even Ironhide. He locked up his doors and windows and sat at the kitchen table of his small, barren apartment, polishing and fixing up his old laser rifle, a relic from his Morphing-yearling, or teenage years. The energy plant was being rationed and made energy prices at night sky-high, making the city shut off even its street lights to preserve energy and credits, further darkening the night. If one were to go out into the street, they would find themselves in a dark so absolute that they might as well have had malfunctioning visual receptors.

Anxiety and a partially angry, defensive hostility filled Ironhide, giving him a sense of paranoia that bade him to shut off his one kitchen light and work by the light of his own chest headlights. Working to clean his rifle, Ironhide's processor raced from one subject to the other.

Ironhide had been a bachelor most of his life. He had been taught to work hard by his gunsmith father and treat people with respect, and had done so, becoming the friend and the go-to guy for almost everyone in his apartment. He had been there for the family, as it has been told, and he was there to comfort his neighbor when the poor fellow had to disown a couple of his Cassetticons when they broke down a store. He had seen his neighbors off when they left, and now there was only one other mech on his floor and, in all, five other residents of the apartment building. The city was quietly being bled dry of its residents even before the Decepticons could come as people fled to safer places. Ironhide had been laid off from his job at the factory when the manager and too many mechs left to either join or flee the war.

Anyway, Ironhide was glad to be a single mech in times like these. Had he a wife-unit and Sparklings, something his mother-unit had been whining to have for years now, he would have fled with the others or sent his family on ahead of them. His worry would have been increased ten fold, knowing in his Spark that any precautions they took would only stall the inevitable wrath of the Decepticons.

The Decepticons; huh, what an under dog-triumphing story, no matter how vile and evil that underdog was. The under dog was a force that had started off small and harmless, with even their leader, Megatron, being captured for a time, before it suddenly exploded into a force of such power and brutality that the Autobot Army was practically useless in their massacring rampages to take over entire cities. As their territory, power, and army grew, so did the peoples' fear for them.

This night's darkness; it was like the peoples' fear, wasn't it? When the people had moved away to Kyron 5 and other supposedly safer places and made the city quiet with out their chatter, it was the beginnings to the stillness the Decepticons created around them, whether the people were expecting them or dead. Now, with most of the people gone and the reports saying that the Decepticons were coming closer and closer with each passing day, fear was increasing and the more it grew, the darker the nights became, just as the light of hope for safety disappeared from the peoples' Sparks.

The Cybertron Council had been destroyed or split up in an attack nearly six months ago. Since then, it had been a rough ruler ship created by the Autobot Army and anyone who had the guns and glory sight enough to take charge. There was no leader, how ever useless they were, to stand at a podium and tell the people that things were under control and that things would get better. There was no one to weave a spell of hope and courage in the air with eloquent words. There was no noticeable warrior to who the people could look and say "we are safe as lone as he stands". Without these figureheads, how ever superficial they were, hope and peace of mind wilted and died under the glare of terror and impending doom.

Ironhide set down his gun and sighed sadly, being unable to do more for it. His headlights dimmed, leaving him in complete darkness.

"We need a hero…" he whispered.

As if to mock these very words, an impact sounded out and light flashed through the screen holes of Ironhide's shutters, lighting up his room dimly as the building shook. He grabbed his gun and sprinted over to a window, knocking a hand into it to open it up and look outside. He knew that he wouldn't like what he saw, but he needed to see it.

Sure enough, large Transformers with the clear parts of jets and other fighter craft on their person were flying low over the buildings before transforming and landing. Someone's parked cruiser had been blown up, lighting up the dark street with flickering purple flames. Beyond the flames' field of light, though, there was only a black void.

A group entered a building and came out a few minutes later, dragging ad kicking and screaming civilian between them. One of the flying mechs landed and pointed a gun at the civilian's head, clearly showing their Decepticon insignia on their chest.

"Surrender your services as a slave and soldier into servitude for the Decepticons or your life is forfeit!" the gun holder shouted.

Ironhide spun around and bolted out of his apartment. As he came to the hall, one of the doors opened up and the only other mech on his floor stepped out, flicking his optics on and off as he was still drowsy from recharge.

"W-Wh-what?" he part stammered, part yawned.

"Decepticon attack!" Ironhide exclaimed, "Grab what ya need and get outa here!"

The other apartment resident cussed and bolted back into his apartment. Perhaps he would escape down the fire escape and make his way through the back allies out of the city. Maybe he would find a weapon, like a gun or a blunt object to defend him self, or might even come out and fight. Or he would cower in a hiding place in his apartment until things were quiet.

Ironhide didn't really care. The hostile paranoia that had been growing in him all night for the past few months had finally been given a reason to evolve into a fiery ball of combat and battle encouragement. Now that the wait was over, all that was left was a sense of relief that it was over so that the action may begin.

Hence, when Ironhide stepped out into the street, gun in hand, a devilish grin was across his face as he stepped into the purple flames' light.

"_Hey!"_ he bellowed, _"I got yer servitude right here, aft-holes!"_

- - - - -

"And then you killed them all?"

"That's what I said," Ironhide replied, nodding.

Daylight had come and the Autobot Army, showing up a little too late as always, was cleaning up and taking care of the dead and wounded. While the collateral damage was phenomenal, the sky over head was bright and sunny, in spite of the clouds that crossed it; it was if somehow hope had been restored in the passing of the Decepticons, even though the future was still dark on the horizon. A medic tended Ironhide's injured arm as he was interviewed by an Autobot squad leader.

"That's a load of hot oil," the squad leader said, crossing his arms.

"Why? What's so difficult to believe about that? There were Decepticons and I shot them, what's more do you want?"

He made it sound like he had run to the store to buy energon and the squad leader said as much.

"Yeah, so? And your point is?"

The squad leader sighed and leaned back, rubbing his forehead and the red police V sign there.

"Look, Mr. Ironhide," the squad leader said. "I'm going to be frank: I don't believe for a micro-second that you killed all those Decepticons single handedly. But I _do_ believe that you killed quite a few, so I'm going to ask you if you will join the Autobots. We need more mechs, especially more mechs with skill. Can we count on you, Ironhide?"

"Sure can, officer," Ironhide said, "I'd be happy to join the army and show you that I _can_ kill over twenty Decepticons on my lonesome."

"Over twenty?" the medic asked.

"Yeah, I lost count around that number," Ironhide admitted, "Took a hard hit to my head."

"As hard as this?"

Before Ironhide could react, the medic slammed his ratchet upside Ironhide's head. Ironhide's optics flicked on and off as his mouth opened and he rubbed the fresh dent, unable to make a noise. Finally, he made some noise to reflect his pain.

"_Oww_! _Yes_, like that, only not as painful! _Slag,_ what do you guys eat!? And what was that for?"

"We eat Decepticon insignias for breakfast and that hit was just to get us introduced," the medic said blandly, holding out a hand as he stood, "Name's Ratchet."

They didn't know it then, but they had just established their relationship for the next millennia: Ironhide fought, got broken, and Ratchet would fix him.

**AN: As usual, any origins not explained in the G1 series are open for request.**

** Next: The Insecticons!**


	19. The Insecticons

**Disclaimer: Hasbro owns Transformers. I claim no rights over the Transformers.**

**Chapter 19: The Insecticons**

Space Station M-186 had deteriorated into the grips of the notorious and foul long before the Great War ever began. Set out in the middle of no-where space, the enormous station was shaped as a needle piercing a main, flat circle complex in which home rooms and a bar set in, with two more, smaller circles on either end equipped with navigation rooms and rockets. Making up the center and main part of the largest circle was a large bar that had, at one time, resembled something of an air port's restaurant area: with many small tables in an open area, sectioned off by small fencing, and stores lining the walls. Now, while the lay out was no different, most of the fencing and even some of the tables had been damaged and removed. The stores lining the walls were either run down and had been converted into apartments or became the work shops of many a gun mech and other unlawful citizen. Any justice holder with a V-badge on their forehead that entered the station would be dead in less than five minutes.

The station was now mostly a rest stop for crooks as they darted back and forth across the universe on illegal errands and was a hide out while fleeing from the authorities. But it had also become the unofficial home to a handful of mechs who just felt comfortable enough in the station to stay with it. An example of such mechs was a trio that now gathered around a well-worn table with partially-empty energon cubes sat in front of them.

"I'm telling you, guys," one of them said, rubbing a hand across his grate-face plate. "The prices for energon just keep getting higher and higher. You don't wanna even _know_ how much I had to pay to get the drinks today."

"Maybe we should take a job up as mercenaries, mercenaries?" another said, twiddling his black metal fingers in boredom.

"_We_ don't need to get a job, Shrapnel," the third mech snickered. "Bombshell can just use his cerebro-shells to make someone hand over some money!"

"Hey, that's not a bad idea, Kickback, Kickback," Shrapnel agreed.

"Yeah, but it's not the money that's got me on edge, but the worth, or lack of, of it," Bombshell said.

A small capsule rolled down from a small gun on Bombshell's shoulder and dropped into his waiting hand. He held it up for his partners to see.

"See this?" he said, "A genuine cerebro-shell, capable of making even the strongest-minded Transformer dance at my bidding. With a little re-programming to make it work for other mechs, I could sell a single pack of five of 'em for over four hundred credits."

He slipped it back into the small shoulder gun and the gun settled down on his shoulder.

"But recently, there have been fewer and fewer customers and those who _do_ buy I have to practically _strangle_ to get a couple dozen credits out of 'em. Haven't you noticed? With the Decepticons destroying entire _networks_ of credit flow in the economy, we're floundering. Rumor has it that the Credit Corner will crash any day now—"

_"Boring_," Kickback yawned, his partial metal wings dropping in annoyance. "Worst comes to worse, we can just _kill_ for what we want, or go to an organic planet and get energon from there. You know, the organic stuff doesn't taste that bad, once you stop thinking about what made it—"

"You're disgusting, Kickback, Kickback," Shrapnel groaned. "Organic energon is so lowly, lowly. What are we, turbo-rats, turbo-rats?"

"Says the mech who claims first dibs on oil fresh from the ground when ever we take a field trip to an organic planet for a private meal," Kickback snickered.

"Oh, shut up, up," Shrapnel sighed.

Kickback merely laughed at Shrapnel's guilty reply. Bombshell, at that moment, planted both hands on the table in front of him as he stood and looked over the heads of the mechs gathered in the bar area.

"Hey," Bombshell said, "Check out the new crowd!"

Across the room was a pair of main doors that led to the docking area. Now a group of mechs had just entered the bar area, tall, strong, polished, and formidable things to look at. There were three identical-looking mechs, varying only in colors: One red and white, the second dark purple and black, and the final dark blue and black. A faceless dark blue and white mech with a Cassetticon handler's window chest carried a cool cloud of void emotion about him. The leader appeared to be a gun-grey mech, almost white in some lights, accented with black and carrying his arm-cannon arm proudly.

Strangers always got looked at when they came, but the Decepticon insignia that the party carried got them looked at most than other strangers. Some mechs stood from their tables, quietly drawing their guns as they glared at the new comers, quietly ordering them to turn around and leave. Just because the majority of Space Station M-186's residents were of the criminal type didn't mean that they were necessarily on the same side of the Decepticons. Bombshell, Kickback, and Shrapnel stayed where they were. They had seen enough rough parties come and go to know to leave the rough housing to the more hot-headed mechs unless they wanted some dents.

"Mechs of M-186," the gun-grey mech announced, "I am Lord Megatron of the Decepticon Army, future ruler of Cybertron and the universe. I happened to be passing by this sad pile of scrap metal when I noticed that there was a collection of lost mechs here who needed direction and a chance at some rather fun, violent, _exercise_…"

Some of the M-168 mechs softened up and even grinned as they elbowed each other and snickered. Megatron was hinting at an opportunity to fight: A thing that they were willing to set aside ethics for. But still there was opposition whose optics only hardened at the proposition.

"Well, the way I see it," Megatron went on with a friendly air, "I need more mechs to fight and you want to fight. I believe that we can work something out, can't we?"

"Slag you, Megatron!" a mech shouted, shooting to their feet. "You're screwing things up enough as it is! Move on and go blow some other city up!"

"Hey!" another mech yelled, jumping to their feet, "Shut up, it's a good deal!"

"How's this for a deal?" another mech yelled, aiming their gun at Megatron, "You die and the universe goes back to normal!"

Megatron ducked the shot that came at him and his party broke apart to avoid it. In moment, Decepticon supporters and opposition were locked in combat, turning the bar into a fight scene.

"What do we do, do?" Shrapnel exclaimed as he and Bombshell stood up and looked about at the violence. Kickback jumped up to crouch on the table.

"Fight everyone!" Kickback whooped, kicking backwards at a mech that passed by him.

The unfortunate mech was knocked clear across the room by Kickback's surprisingly strong strike. Bombshell and Shrapnel exchanged looks then smiled as they shrugged and joined the fight. Kickback did a back flip, landing with a slam on top of a mech's shoulders.

Bombshell aimed his small shoulder gun at a mech near him.

"Hey, ugly, over here!" he yelled.

His target turned around, only to catch one of Bombshell's cerebro-shells when he shot it. The cerebro shell drilled into the target's forehead and a glazed look came over his optics.

"Fight for me!" Bombshell ordered.

Obediently his target rejoined the fighting with stiff, deliberate moves with a blank face plate and mute vocalize unity. Bombshell kept close to his larger body guard, but couldn't help but making the mech doing a ridiculous jig or dance now and then. He snickered at the looks of the surrounding fighters when he made his slave hop from one foot to the other, shaking his hands in a foolish fashion. While the enemy mech was still staring, Bombshell stated a simple order incoherent to the others and his slave punched the confused mech in the face.

Shrapnel, mean while, strode through the crowd and went straight for a section of the wall that had been removed during an old repair job and had never been fixed. In the cavity of the wall, he found a large generator. He stopped in front of the generator, reached one of his fists back, and slammed it into the generator as hard as he could. There was a loud crunching-clunk noise as his fist smashed through the generator's shell and into the mat of wires and computer boards with in. Purple-blue electricity appeared and flailed about, as if it were a genie escaping its bottle. Shrapnel, unbothered by the energy gushing over him, turned around and aimed his palms out at the crowd. A crack and flash sounded out as a thick, firm stream of electricity went from the generator to him and came out of his palms to strike and fry his targets. His targets writhed and screamed in pain under the lashings of energy on their circuits and Shrapnel smiled cruelly in satisfaction.

The old space station's lights flickered as the entire craft shuddered and shook unhealthily with its energy flow disrupted. Suddenly, the lights, as well as the artificial gravity, went out, leaving the brawlers to float weightlessly in a dim environment. For a moment, everyone was caught off guard and fell silent by the unusual circumstances. Then Kickback launched himself off the wall and tackled a Transformer with an excited shout.

"FIGHT!!" he cheered.

A back up generator came to life with a guttural groan and light and gravity was restored. The fight resumed.

Kickback found himself wrapped around the shoulders of a particularly large mech—a cargo hauler of some sort—preparing to kick his processor right off his shoulders, when the kicker realized that the cargo-hauler was grabbing him in preparation to rip him in half. Kickback screeched fearfully and struggled about to escape his foe's grip. Bombshell and Shrapnel heard their friend's call and Bombshell shot two more of his cerebro-shells into the foreheads of two more mechs.

"Help me!" he ordered, leading the way to the cargo-hauler Transformer.

Shrapnel turned his energy-flinging ability toward the enemy, only to feel the energy stop coursing from the generator. The electricity sparked and fizzed out as his finger tips. He looked at his hands and at the generator, slamming a fist onto it.

"Come on, not now, now!" he hissed.

At that moment, a mech got the better of the black and dark purple Decepticon jet-Former and he was flung through the air and slammed into the wall with Shrapnel under him.

Kickback, meanwhile, could feel his opponent tightening his grip around his powerful legs and arms and felt his abdomen being stretched as the mech pulled. Even Kickback's unusually powerful kicks could not break him free of his fate, but merely stall it.

Just as it looked hopeless, an enormous, violent, flushing explosion sounded out. A large ray of purple laser light flew through the air, completely incinerating the head of the mech about to rip Kickback apart. This time, everyone froze and turned to look at the source of the laser blast: Megatron, currently kneeling over a mech that he held up by the front of their armor while his other arm was aimed up at the now-headless target.

After a moment, the headless body released Kickback and collapsed to the floor in a racket of crashing metal. Kickback scrambled to his feet and bolted over to Bombshell. Bombshell patted his friend to make sure that he was okay then noticed that Shrapnel was being sat on. He looked at his mind-control slaves and motioned for them to haul the jet-Former off of their friend.

"Now," Megatron snapped in the shock silence. "Does anyone have any _objections_ to recruitment?"

The mech he was holding began to raise their hand. Megatron glared about at the other brawlers as he promptly shot his target in the face. He let the graying, dead body fall to the floor as he stood up, holding his smoking arm cannon up. The twisted look of inpatients and rage on his face plate clearly showed that he was not in the mood for even a _joke_ of a denial.

"Well?" he demanded.

One of the M-168 mechs finally knew what to say and punched the air.

"All hail Lord Megatron!" he shouted.

The other mechs eagerly joined the cheer; whether or not they actually wanted to fight for Megatron was irrelevant. What mattered was that they would get out of M-168 alive.

Bombshell and Kickback, meanwhile, helped the slightly flattened Shrapnel to his feet as Bombshell's slaves hauled the jet-Former off of him and took him aside to be beaten, as ordered by Bombshell.

"You okay, Shrapnel?" Bombshell asked.

"I'm fine, fine," Shrapnel groaned, "I just feel squished, squished."

"It looks like your powers didn't work so well," Kickback said, "Should've used your cloning powers."

"Control electricity and you control the world, world," Shrapnel merely replied, removing himself from his friends to stand on his own two feet.

Bombshell's slaves were about to start walloping into the purple-black jet-Former when he suddenly disappeared in a small purple flash, only to reappear behind them. The trio of comrades watched in part amazement, part entertainment, as the jet-Former promptly beat the tar out of the slaves; one he downed with a single to the back of the neck. The other two, he slammed their processors together several times, efficiently knocking the cerebro-shells from their foreheads. He left them to sit on the ground and groan in a part-unconsciouse stupor as he turned his glowing red sights on the trio.

"Alright," he snarled, "Who's the little slag who told those goofs to get me?"

The other M-168 residents were conveniently ignoring the awkward encounter as they filed out of the Station on their way to their service in the Decepticon army. The trio of smaller mechs clenched their fists and prepared to fight when the red-white jet-Former strode over to them.

"Skywarp!" he snapped in an obnoxious high, whinny voice, "You're supposed to be making sure that no mechs are calling for the Autobots! Can't I trust you with even _that_ miniscule task? What are you doing, answer me!"

"These little slaggers just tried offing me, Starscream," Skywarp snarled, pointing at Bombshell, Shrapnel, and Kickback.

"You sat on me, me!" Shrapnel snapped.

"What's the matter with _you_; took a hit too hard to the processor?" Starscream sneered at him.

"A mere coding issue, issue," Shrapnel assured. He spotted several scrap pieces from broken up tables and chairs and held his hand out to them. "I have a habit of _copying_, copying."

Starscream and Skywarp turned, dropping their jaws in shock as the scrap pieces shivered grew, changing and shifting to form multiple Shrapnel Transformers. The Shrapnel smirked in triumph while Bombshell and Kickback exchanged proud, smug looks behind his back. Shrapnel's smirk faded, how ever, when there was the click and hum of a laser charging up to the side.

"Power down now or I will be forced to waste such a valuable asset like you," Megatron growled.

Reluctantly, Shrapnel released his hold on the scrap metal pieces. Instantly they unfolded and melted back into their original forms. Reluctantly, the trio held their hands up in defeat as they turned to Megatron. Starscream smirked and kicked at one of the scrap pieces, as if he had vanquished their cloned alt-forms.

"State your designations and abilities," Megatron ordered.

"Bombshell; I can control mechs with my cerebro-shells," he tapped his small launch gun and gestured to Skywarp's three opponents.

"I am Shrapnel, Shrapnel. I can control electricity when there are large amounts of it about, like in a storm, storm. I can also turn scrap bits into clones of myself, myself."

"Makes since: Little piece of scrap can make more of himself out of scrap," Skywarp snorted.

Shrapnel shot a glare at Skywarp and raised a threatening finger that said, _watch it, boy, I can own you._

"I'm Kickback, and I can kick the slag out of you."

"Oh, really?" Megatron cackled.

Kickback stared at Megatron as he laughed. He kept his optics on Megatron even as he suddenly leaped up and did a sideways kick at the wall. Several bits of the wall went flying, making Bombshell and Shrapnel turn their faces away from the bits, and a deep hole was left where Kickback had kicked it. Megatron fell silent, clicking his optics on and off in surprise. Starscream's face was that of disbelief. Skywarp slowly side-stepped away, muttering something about watching out for Autobots before teleporting out of the room.

"Hmm, impressive," Megatron said, crossing his arms across his chest. "Tell me, have you _always_ wasted your time in a scrap pit like this?"

"Ever since we were Morphing-yearlings, yearlings," Shrapnel chuckled, exposing his hands as if to show his life, "We just never got the hang of making an honest living, living, especially when, with Bombshell's abilities, we can just _make_ a mech give us their credits, credits!"

"Hmm. Pity. What a waste of power," Megatron tsked. "I'll fix that. All three of you: Come along. You have just been enlisted into my army. Do you have a _problem_ with that?"

Starscream aimed his shoulder cannons at the trio and Megatron stroked his arm-cannon. The trio looked up at them warily as they leaned together.

"If Kickback can distract the silver one, I can launch a cerebro-shell into the jet and get them to kill each other while we get out of here," Bombshell whispered.

"Why run, run?" Shrapnel asked. "This might be more fun than waiting around in a trash bin for the rest of our cycles, cycles. What do you think, Kickback, Kickback?"

"Eh, if there's energon and action, I don't care," Kickback said with an apathetic shrug.

"Then it's decided, decided," Shrapnel confirmed. Aloud, he announced, "We will join you, Megatron, Megatron."

He saluted and Kickback and Bombshell did like wise. Starscream frowned at not getting to execute some mechs, but Megatron smirked as he pulled some metal Decepticon stick-on insignias from a compartment on his person and tossed them to the trio. The trio caught the Decepticon insignias and looked down at them curiously before pasting them on their chests.

"A wise choice in deed, mechs," Megatron purred approvingly.

The trio would change body shape over the following millennia. They would get more guns, more fighting experience, and Bombshell's shell launcher would move to his forehead. But what would become most noticeable in changes would be when they would make the fateful choice of boarding a ship someday called the _Nemesis_. The same _Nemesis_ that would crash onto a distant organic planet, but they would escape from and live in exile in the lush forests, obtaining bug-like forms that would give them their legendary name of the Insecticons.

**Author's Note: Any origins not fully explained in Transformers G1 may be requested for an appearance in the story.**


	20. Cosmos

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Chapter 20: Cosmos**

There were seven Kyron planets in all, from Kyron 1 to Kyron 7, and all were inhabited by one's typical hard working mechs who were often disregarded as being less blessed or more savage just because they didn't have the latest and greatest technology and living conditions about. All the Kyron planets were barren rock planets or large asteroids. Kyron 1 through 3 had long since been bled dry of their energon and had been destructed for their metals, reducing them into a collection of rocks orbiting around enormous space stations of the same name. Kyron 4 was a tiny planet, held in tact only by its violent, old-tradition residents. Kyron 6 and 7 were middle-class planets with their spots of Cybertronian-grade civilization out posts. Kyron 5 kept to the traditions.

Kyron 5 was continuously being bombarded with asteroids and made any sort of permanent out post on its surface impossible. Hence, the residents of the enormous rock planet went underground, mining and living in networks of caverns, tunnels, and caves that nearly made the planet hollow with their miles-long tracks. Entire cities had been built in the larger caverns, knowing that the diamond-hard rock and asteroid showers together would protect them from surface invaders.

It was because of this high defense that war refugees were flocking from all over the galaxy to hide with in Kyron 5's dark tunnels from the Decepticons, and why Cosmos' family's inn was doing so well.

"Cosmos!" a pale blue and olive green mech yelled over the bustle of the inn's restaurant, "Tables six and eight need cleaning up and we gotta clean out some of the storage rooms to house the next wave of refugees!"

"I'm on it," Cosmos called back, clearing off the mentioned tables and taking them to the kitchen.

Cosmos was a born-and-bred Kyron resident and it showed: Squat, blocky, with a non-existent neck and merely carrying a mis-proportioned cylinder as a head with a strange, hexagonal face mask, diamond-shaped optics, and a widow's peak helmet front, he matched the body frame of a Kyron resident. He had the olive green color of his father and the yellow of his mother (Primus bless her Spark, but curse the asteroid rains), with his own unique red helmet, and was a helpful lad. As far as he was concerned, it _was_ a bit disturbing that his father was so eager to make money off of housing war refugees that came to Kyron 5 by the hundreds every day, but then again, it wasn't cheap running an inn capable of housing up to three hundred bodies.

After the kitchen duties and cleaning out the storage rooms to convert them into more housing rooms, Cosmos was finally released from his duties for the day. He eagerly left the overly loud and crowded inn, the _Basalt Inn_, and made his way to the "outdoors" of his home cavern Chamber 3-16.

Chamber 3-16 was one of the largest caverns on Kyron 5. The exact dimensions of how large it was escaped Cosmos, but he knew, for sure, that riding the subway train from one side of the cavern to the other would take at least ten minutes at speeds clocking around a hundred miles an hour, and that if one free-fell from the very top of the cavern, they would spend approximately to the count of twenty before they hit the ground. Cosmos should know; it was a common past time for Kyron youth to play a game of chicken with the ground and gravity before they Transformed into their alt-modes to save their lives.

Buildings had been constructed from metal and rock with in the cavern and along the enormous spire in the center of it, reaching to the ceiling to support it. More homes had been carved straight into the rocky walls; no small feat, considering that the rock was hard enough to make all but the hardest of Transformer drills shatter upon attempting to break it.

Cosmos headed for the spire in the center of Chamber 3-16. At the base of the spire was the greeting station, as with in the spire was an elevator leading to the surface. The elevator was constantly being monitored by at least one security officer now-a-days to raise the alarm of Decepticons ever decided to drop by for a visit on Kyron 5. If the Decepticons showed up, the alarm would be raised and any and all entrances to the surface would be locked down.

Today, the guard was a mech Cosmos recognized; a fellow, squat, black Kyron 5 resident by the name of Luxor. Luxor's pale blue optics expressed the friendly smile his face mask-hidden mouth could not as he waved a greeting hand at Cosmos.

"How goes the war?" Cosmos asked.

"Poorly, sadly," Luxor replied. "The Decepticons have conquered thirty-five percent of Cybertron and are only increasing their pace. They have even started destroying the less important, minor planets in an attempt to flush out Autobots and force everyone onto one planet."

"Primus," Cosmos swore. "Are they heading to any of the Kyron planets or satellites yet?"

"No, thank the All Spark for that," Luxor sighed. "You going up?"

"Yeap."

"Alright, be careful up there."

"Thanks, Luxor."

Cosmos tapped at a couple buttons on the pink metal wall and the doors slid open into a large elevator. He stepped in and the doors shut. He patiently waited for the six-minute elevator ride to be complete. Looking around at the extremely large elevator, he saw numerous luggage chests lying around, forgotten by their owners in their rush to start a new life on what they hoped to be a safe planet. A four-eyed, six-legged feline pet-mech was napping on a forgotten polishing cloth one of the luggage cases; a stray making itself at home where ever it went. Cosmos noticed something tucked under the polishing cloth and, out of curiosity, roamed over to it.

He tugged on the polishing cloth, making the feline wake up to glare at him, as if to say _do you __mind__??_ He tugged harder on the cloth and the feline got off, bounding over to the side of the elevator where it got up on another luggage chest to hiss at Cosmos. A chinking noise of underlying gears was heard among the hissing, but Cosmos ignored the angry animal as he pulled up on the polishing cloth. The cloth unwound from around the object it held and the object clunked to the floor with a small clatter of metal. Cosmos dropped the polishing cloth and stared at the object in surprise.

The object was a gun; it was a thick, silver, polished war weapon. Guns, in themselves, were no new items to Cosmos. He had seen many mechs carrying them around as security grew, and had even wielded one himself once when the whole of Kyron 5 had been rustled up on a mech hunt for a dangerous psychopath. But to find a weapon being left behind so carelessly among the luggage was a dangerous thing. What if a Sparkling found it and accidentally shot themselves, or a Morphing-yearling mis-used it? It was not a good thing. But he could see how it got there; some father-unit somewhere had brought it along to protect his family, or some over-heated Morphing-yearling had prepared himself for battle, only to recklessly forget the weapon when the danger had passed.

At the top of the elevator was a surface station set in a large, shallow cave in a mountain side. Here, the expansive floor was divided into parking spaces by white lines and along the sides were smaller chambers for Transformers to rest in between elevator trips, or before they left Kyron 5. The elevator itself was off to the side. The station's attendance crew was polishing up the floor and generally keeping the place tidy and protected. When Cosmos came to the surface station, he walked straight up to the guard standing by the door and handed them the weapon.

"Here," he explained, "I found this among the lost luggage in the elevator. Somebody should keep that place clean."

The guard raised an eye brow as he looked down at the weapon handed to him and agreed, "Aww, yeah, definitely. Hey, are you going out?"

"Sure am," Cosmos confirmed.

"Can't; big asteroid shower coming," the guard cautioned. "The biggest in the century, I heard."

"Well, can I at least get _ten minutes_ outside?" Cosmos pleaded, "I've been underside for the past week and I need to float or sink!"

"Well… okay," the guard said as he tapped in the open code on the cave doors' lock pad, "You got ten minutes. But then you got to haul your back end here _fast_ or it's _your_ energon that will be crispy."

"Thanks, I'll be back by then!" Cosmos promised, running out of the bay doors as they slid open.

Cosmos transformed into a saucer-shaped space craft with a giant red button on top before gliding over the barren, rocky ground making up the surface of Kyron 5. Through the planet's thin atmosphere he went until it was in the planet's orbit. It was nice to experience some quiet after the hustle and bustle of working in the _Basalt Inn_, not to mention get the elbow room.

As he came to a weightless hover over Kyron, staring down at the rocky planet, Cosmos detected something coming to the planet. Turning, he saw a peculiar patch of silver in the far off distance.

"That must be the asteroid shower," Cosmos commented to himself. "Wow, it's a big one alright. I sure hope everyone gets indoors before it hits. But what's that dark patch?"

The dark patch Cosmos had noticed was a tiny dark speck flying ahead of the in-coming asteroid shower. Cosmos zoomed in on it and was startled to see that it was a Transformer military space ship of some kind, circular and flattish in shape. An Autobot insignia was stamped on the front of it.

"Uh oh," Cosmos muttered, "Those guys better get going if they want to get here before that asteroid shower does."

A beep sounded from Cosmos as someone hailed him on his built-in communicator, the phone that most Transformers had. He reflexively answered the phone assuming that it was his father-unit calling him to call him back to the inn, as usual. Running and inn was hard work and a forty-six hour job, after all…

"Hello, Cosmos here," he greeted.

"_-71andweneedhelpnow!!"_ a voice responded. _"Wedon'tneeditinaminute,inasecond,inamicro-second,butweneeditnowbecauseifwedon'tgethelpwe'regoingtobeasteroiddinner,dead,tarnished,scrapes,totaled,destroyed,vaporized,'mtooyoungtodie!!"_

"Huh?" Cosmos asked. "Look, if this is the whack job from Chamber 36-7 again, I'm telling you now that it's _not funny_—"

"_OUR SHIP IS DAMAGED AND WE ARE GOING TO DIE!!!"_

"Primus! Okay, okay, take it easy, I'll help!" Cosmos exclaimed, shooting forward toward the Autobot craft. His tone was that of annoyance at the excess drama; more than enough pilots got into similar situations other every week to make the decision of rescue or abandonment a minor one.

"Give me your mooring lines," Cosmos said as he flew up to the craft, "I'll pull you down."

"_Aren't you a bit small to haul this craft?"_ a different person asked over the communication link.

Two large cables were rolled out of their settings in small pockets on the front of the ship. Cosmos cast an optic up and down the ship and supposed that it _was_ a bit large at being approximately thirty-six times larger than him. The cables floated in space until Cosmos flew over and grabbed them up.

"I'm a pure Kyron unit, through and through," he said proudly. "We're tougher, faster, and stronger than any other mechs!"

To show this point off, Cosmos flew back to Kyron 5, towing the large Autobot craft behind him. True to his word, towing the damaged craft proved to be no large task for Cosmos. But the asteroid shower was glowing brighter behind him and, as they re-entered the thin atmosphere, he could hear the roar of their flames.

"Alright, everybody, hold on!" he called.

Gravity caught up to the crafts and both of them suddenly plummeted down, coming dangerously close to the ground before Cosmos pulled up. The rear end of the Autobot ship banged into the ground, sending sparks and metal debris flying every which-way before Cosmos pulled it higher.

"Gain some altitude!" Cosmos yelled, "I can't do _all_ the work!"

"_We'retryingbutourenginesaredying;dyinglikeacanofoldenergon,anolddog-mech,,mech,orwe'redeadandhopeless—"_

Cosmos turned off his communication connection with the ship. He was already getting a processor ache from the over-talkative Transformer. He could feel the craft pulling at his back, but what scared him more were the shockwaves sounding out behind him. He glanced backwards only momentarily and saw the rare sight of an asteroid shower as it impacted Kyron 5: At first, it was a bright glow from above, then it grew brighter and brighter before a pure column of white light slammed into the ground, sending a shower of rock flying into the air and ushering a roar of impact into the air. It was beautiful, but it was also deadly, and unless Cosmos picked up the pace, he and the Autobots were about to become fused into the ground.

He sent out a call to the guards of the cave he had exited out of, "This is Kyron 5 resident Cosmos calling to Surface Station 17: Are the doors still open?"

"_Yeah, but not for long,"_ was the ominous reply, _"You got three minutes!"_

"Can I get five? I got some guys in tow that need help here!"

"_No, three minutes, or there won't be a Surface Station 17!"_

"I'll be there," Cosmos assured.

An asteroid struck a little too close behind the Autobot ship and the craft suddenly bucked its back end up, giving Cosmos some unexpected slack and making him shoot forward even as he, himself, attempted to stay steady in the resulting shockwave. He emitted a mechanical version of a "woha" and sped up. Going at top speed now, the asteroid shower was slowly gathering around him, over taking him and his tow and making the surface a more and more dangerous place.

But there! There was the cave in the mountain side! Oh Primus, let him make it; being crushed in an asteroid shower was a slow, painful death.

Around a boulder here, vaulting over an already-landed asteroid there, and yanking the Autobot craft all the way to the right to keep it from dragging him aside, Cosmos' sights were on the doors and all else was just an obstacle he would get by automatically.

Ninety yards, he thought he heard the starting whirr of machinery. Eighty yards, an asteroid landed dangerously close to his left, making him temporarily blind with the resulting flash and shower of dirt. Seventy yards, he could hear the distant buzzer warning that the doors were going to shut. Sixty yards, an asteroid landed in front of him, but he flew right over it, making the Autobot craft's belly loose a large amount of paint as it scraped on the fresh asteroid boulder. Fifty yards, he saw the edges of the doors drawing closer. Forty yards, the cables were dragging on his crafts' gripping claws and he could feel bolts groaning in their settings, threatening to let go. Thirty yards, he saw the metal doors of the surface station sliding together. Twenty yards—

At twenty yards, a fiery ball of rock a little larger than Cosmos landed right on his tail end, snapping the mooring cables connecting him to the Autobot craft. Cosmos felt the large impact, followed up by a burning sensation that spread through out his body, making him transform back into robot mode with a shout of pain. The shockwave of the landing rock cast him forward like a Sparkling throwing away a toy they were frustrated with while the Autobot craft's nose reared high up in the air on top of the same shockwave's force. The Autobot craft's back end slammed into the ground, becoming shreds of metal as a large portion of it was scraped off by the rocky surface.

Together, Cosmos and the craft tumbled through the bay lock doors with seconds to spare. As the doors slammed shut and locked behind them, Cosmos slammed down to land on his face and rolled over a couple of times before coming to a stop sprawled on the ground. Mere feet over him, the Autobot craft he rescued slammed into the ground and wound up doing a complete roll over Cosmos before continuing to roll and bounce across the surface station's interior before slamming to a stop in the far wall. Surface Station 17's personnel darted every which-way to avoid the crashing craft. After slamming into the wall the craft, miraculously, landed right back down on its belly; scratched, dented, with lots of metal plating missing, and even on fire here and there, but landing perfectly in a parking space, as if insisting on propriety in spite of its trashed condition.

The Surface Station personnel rushed to put out the craft's fires and tend to the injured as the bay doors trembled and shook as the asteroid shower rained on outside, making everyone with in shout over the loud thunder noise the asteroids made.

"Cosmos, Cosmos!" Luxor's father-unit shouted, running over to his son-unit and sitting him up. "I was looking for you when I heard that you came to the surface, and when the asteroid shower started—"

He looked over at the Autobot craft, then looked back at his son-unit.

"What the slag happened!?"

"Pop," Cosmos panted, "I would be glad to tell you, but for now, my energy cells need a recharge."

With that said, Cosmos passed out.

- - - -

"You see, Blurr and I are apart of the Autobot Army, and recently our crew was ordered to go out and set up recruiting station on the Kyron stations and planets. We were coming to Kyron 5 when the Decepticons got wind of our activity and shot us up and left us to get vaporized in that asteroid shower. If you hadn't come along and saved us, Cosmos, we would be energon dust now. By the way, what's with the giant red button on your alt-mode? Are you supposed to self-destruct if someone presses it? It's not very smart to have a self-destruct button where any one can have it, and did I mention that it's totally awesome how you towed us to safety all on your lonesome--?"

"Thanks, Autobot Bluestreak, we Kyron-units are a strong model," Cosmos rushed in before the talkative Autobot could continue.

They were still in the surface station. The Autobot craft was being quickly repaired by numerous Kyron residents. The blue and white mech that had called him self Blurr had sped off to start his recruiting duties. Cosmos had hoped that with the absence of the speedster, he wouldn't have to do with excessive chatter, but Bluestreak had quickly banished such hopes. He wondered if he could call the repair mechs back to seal up his audio receptors like they had sealed up the damage he had received from the asteroid's impact. Judging by the look on his face plate, Cosmos was sure that his father was mere moments away from decking Bluestreak out in an attempt to keep his vocal processor on a normal speech length.

"Yeah, we got that," Bluestreak agreed. "And we need strong mechs now more than ever. Do you want to join? Eh, what do you say? We could use a mech like you: Fast, strong, smart, decent enough of a guy. We have more than enough openings every where and the health benefits are great!"

"I don't know," Cosmos said nervously, "I don't have any special skills or anything."

"Sure you do, Cosmos," Cosmos' father-unit said, "You're a patient mech, and you're a natural when it comes to land surveying!"

"Pop, staring at the planet from orbit for hours on end and being able to recall it is _not_ surveying."

"Actually, it is," Bluestreak pointed out.

"See? You'll fit right in, Cosmos!"

"But what about the _Basalt Inn, _Pop?"

"Heh, there's so many jobless mechs running around here that I can get all the help I need. Cosmos," the father-unit went on, becoming serious, "Everybody keeps coming to Kyron 5, and I've heard enough stories, seen enough broken families, and seen enough bloodied mechs come off the elevator shaft to know that things are serious out there. The Autobots, and Cybertron, need help or the Decepticons are just going to come here, and then what? Where will be _our_ Kyron 5? Where will _we _run and hide to? I may be too old to fight, Cosmos, but you aren't. Can you fight in my stead, Cosmos?"

What could Cosmos say? He loved his father-unit dearly and could barely say no to him. Fighting a war, though, seemed like a pretty tall order to fill. Cosmos could die out there, see and do things he would wish he could un-see and undo. However, his father-unit was expressing wisdom in the sense of what would happen if or when the Decepticons came. Every one came to Kyron 5, the most distant and well-protected planet in the Transformers' space kingdom, but what would happen if the Decepticons came? Sure, they could last a long time, with wise actions, but a weakness _would_ be found, and while the rocky ground was hard, it _was_ penetrable by the proper drill and equipment. After that, where would they go? Where _could_ they go?

With that reasoning stated, when the first shipment of new recruits left Kyron 5 a week later, Cosmos was sitting at one of the window seats of the interstellar jet, watching his barren, hardy home planet shrink from sight. He could only hope that he would be able to see it again.


	21. Grapple anad Hoist

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Chapter 21: Grapple and Hoist**

The thing with working with sun light was that it was so fickle when it came to movement. Just as one was able to firmly get a grasp on where the light was coming from, the sun would shift and one would need to look at one's project from an entirely different angle. But Grapple liked working with sun light when he was building scale models of his project because he found it more relaxing than when he worked with artificial lighting. Such relaxation allowed his yellow metal hands to maneuver around, gently dabbing glue onto tiny soft metal pieces and placing said pieces perfectly onto the rest of the model. Sighing, he set the glue tube down and sat back.

On the table in front of him, there sat a two-foot by two-foot miniature model of a city, filled with buildings of every geometric possibility, connected by in-the-air- highways that could turn on their axis, and even had tiny vehicle-form Transformers and antennae spikes on the buildings. He smiled happily at his work. Around him, the large, empty metal room did not give an opinion on his work, but the sun light pouring in through the large square window seemed to glow in approval.

He just sat there, admiring his handiwork and reminiscing about the good old days. The days when he could just pick up his hologram informer and be told what the numbers at the Credit Corner were, and when he was proud to see several dozen mechs enlisting their own stocks into his building design company. Those were the days when he would be woken up in the dark hours of the morning to get ready for an opening for another one of his beautiful, artistic buildings, not because soldiers had come knocking on his door, warning him that the Decepticons were coming. Those were the days where he and his closest friends lived in a lavish apartment together, and did not live in a bunker with a couple hundred other war refugees guarded by a hundred-and-a-half Autobots. Ah, yes, those were the good old days. Now, he was lucky if he could even get the news of the surrounding _four miles_, let alone the Credit Corner.

He heard feet approaching and turned in his chair to see a green Transformer with a yellow visor for optics enter the room.

"Hello, Grapple," the new mech greeted.

"Hello, Hoist," Grapple replied, "Time for curfew already?"

"I'm afraid so, so down goes the shutters. I'll get it for you."

"Thank you, Hoist."

"No trouble at all."

Hoist went over to the window and pressed a button on the side of it. With a whirr of gears, a metal shield slid down, covering up the window and blocking out the last rays of the setting sun that poured over the ruined city outside. Grapple noticed how Hoist remained facing the wall and tilted his black head to the side.

"Hoist, is there something the matter?" Grapple inquired, "Did you see someone we knew?"

He used past tense; many a mech that had frequented Grapple and Hoist's apartment had disappeared when the war had started and Grapple had failed to ever regain contact. Now a-days, if they were unfortunate to see someone they recognized enter the base, the acquaintance was usually either dead, dying, or emotionally shattered by the trauma of war. Grapple and Hoist's crowd was a soft one, and was very delicate to matters like violence and war. To avoid such unpleasant encounters, Grapple had taken to hiding in isolated parts of the bunker, using whatever material he could find to create miniature models of the buildings that he had designed and were currently in pieces somewhere out in the battlefield. It was his way of clinging to a hopeless past. Hoist, how ever, had moved on and exercised his medical abilities to help in the medical rooms of the base. Hoist always saw it as a sort of ironic, cosmic joke that his doctrine in medical knowledge was actually being used, as the doctrine was just a tradition for his family.

"Hoist?" Grapple asked.

"No, no, I didn't see anyone we recognized," Hoist said, turning to Grapple. "But I've been thinking, Grapple: the medics and doctors keep telling me that I am rather well skilled as a repair-mech, and they could really use me on the field…"

"Hoist," Grapple said, rearing his head back slightly. "Are you suggesting that you are considering the idea of becoming an all-out Autobot mechanic?"

"Well, it's not like it can get much worse, can it?" Hoist said with a shrug, "Locked in side the same bunker day after day, rationed energon, no private space what so ever, no good entertainment than sharing war stories, listening to the little Sparklings and Morphing-yearlings sob in the night for their lost parent-units. I figured that if I'm going to be miserable, that I might as well contribute something to the world while I'm at it."

"But you could get _killed _out there!" Grapple exclaimed, raising his hands and dropping them for emphasis, "Hoist, please, don't do this to yourself! Stay here, where it's safe."

"Grapple, do you remember how we met?"

"Of course I do; it was one of the best times of my life. I was at the Credit Corner, trying to make some credits off of the stocks so I could invest it into my architect company. I lost all my invested credits in the first hour, but then you gave me some more credits and pointed out some good stocks to invest in. You were a medical college student in the last stretches of your education and were just being bored, playing with the family money. We _both_ made a killer on the stocks and our friendship grew from that."

"And it has been a beautiful friendship, hasn't it? As beautiful as your buildings."

"Flattery will get you everywhere," Grapple chuckled. "But… why do you bring this up?"

"As my friend, Grapple, I'm begging you to understand me when I say that I feel it to be my civic duty to go out and aide the Autobot Army as one of their repair mechs and to let me go."

"But as your friend, I'm terrified of you getting shot, or maimed, or crushed, or scarred, or _worse _while you're out there in the battlefield! Please, Hoist, don't go!"

"It's—it's too late, Grapple," Hoist said, "I've already signed up and I will be leaving with one of the squads tomorrow at first light."

"Hoist!"

"I _must _do this, Grapple, I _know_ I must!" Hoist exclaimed as he rushed out of the room.

Grapple stood, knocking his chair over, and faced the door, hands clenched far from his sides. For a minute, it looked like he was about to stalk after Hoist and physically force him to stop from going out with the Autobots. But after a moment, he emitted a frustrated shout as he turned and swung a hand out, destroying his carefully crafted miniature city in one fell swoop of his arm.

- - - -

The bunker was the only thing left standing, as for miles around the metal ground had been torn up and ripped apart, exposing sterile soil beneath it. Powdery dust with fine particles swirled up and into the sky with every tiny air current, making it seem as if the ground was still smoking from recent fires. In front of the bunker was a large cargo hauler equipped with a bench-lined trailer. The Autobot troops being sent out stated their name and job to the officer standing at the end of the trailer before being checked off their list and being waved on.

Like all the other new recruits, Hoist was permitted one small bag to be taken with him filled with whatever personal items he wished. He had brought along his tools and some hologram pads picturing crowning moments in his life: His medical doctrine, a family portrait from when he was a Sparkling, him as a Sparkling with his pet turbo-fox, a school picture of him in his Morphing-yearling years, and a small album filled with his times with Grapple. He flipped through the hand-held booklet album as he waited his turn in line to be taken aboard the cargo hauler.

He opened up the booklet, revealing an empty space between the two black plastic coverings. Some silver nodes flashed on the inside of the covers and numerous tiny, thin laser lights flashed up, connecting together in 3-D images. First was of him and Grapple at Hoist's graduation party. Hoist was leaning against Grapple, wrapping one, energon-glass-carrying arm around Grapple's neck while the other proudly waved his new doctrine over his head. Heh, Hoist had vowed _never _to loose his control around energon like _that_ again after that night's hangover.

He pressed the side button and picture after picture spun around and was replaced by another one of him, Grapple, or both of them, in some new dinner party at some fancy event, or even just in a hotel room having fun. So many good times…

He noticed that he was next in line and sighed, pocketing the album.

"Oh well," he muttered, "I suppose it's best for us to leave this way; better than moping around with ourselves worrying for the other like a bunch of old biddies."

"Name and job, soldier?" the officer asked.

"My name is Hoist, and I'm a repair mech, sir," Hoist replied.

"Alright then, get in there."

Hoist placed a boot on the edge of the trailer high up and got help from the soldiers already in the trailer to get into it. After some scraping of metal boots on the trailer floor, Hoist made it up and found a seat on the end on which to place him self. He felt a dooming sort of weight fall on his Spark, knowing that it was too late now to turn back. He sighed and clutched his bag to himself, staring sadly at his feet.

"Name and job, soldier?" he heard the officer asked.

"Designation Grapple, and I'm an engineer and soldier, sir."

"We're all soldiers now, Grapple. Get on up there."

Hoist did a double take when he heard the voices: Grapple!? _His_ Grapple? No, it couldn't be--!

But yes, getting help from some other mechs into the high trailer was a cultured-looking yellow mech, his bag small and slung over his shoulder. He was already winded by getting into the trailer and gladly took a seat beside Hoist. He grinned when he saw Hoist's look of shock and laughed.

"Why the shell-shocked face plate?" he laughed, "You don't think that I was about to leave you all on your own, did you?"

"But-but-but-but you were so against it!" Hoist stammered.

"I _know _I was against it, but only because I was worried for you! Come now, come now; wipe that look off your face before it gets stuck like that. We're friends, Hoist, and we always will be. So, where are we heading?"

"To the thick of it; Cybertron," Hoist replied.

"Cybertron, eh? Well, then, let's see how a couple of rich bolts like ourselves can handle ourselves in war."

**Author's Note****: This is the last call for any and all Transformer origins not fully explained in the G1 series. If you requested someone and I haven't posted it yet, request it one final time. I think that it's about time to wrap this puppy up, so once the next chapter is up, there is officially no more requesting. Everyone is an Autobot from here on out, unless other-wise requested, so if you want a Decepticon or two, request!**

** Coming up next: First, it'll be Mirage. Then: You've been asking again and again, and finally we have a possible origin to the legendary Optimus Prime. Megatron started out as a good guy with some rather strong opinions, so who was his arch enemy before the legendary trucker became the savior of the universe? Stay tuned!**


	22. Mirage

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Chapter 22: Mirage**

"_I_ am the son of Baron von Vision, head mech and ruler of the B:16 Energon Mines and Ranch, the mech who is gracious enough to pay for you and house your little ones in his enormous, beautiful mansion. _I_ am the heir to endless fortune, B:16 and all its assets, approximately 67.89 _million_ credits in bonds and stocks alone, and _I_ have only to ask for it and my father-unit could have you of out this place so fast, your processor will spin! _I_ am the most powerful mech in the room right now and_ I _could get you _arrested_, so tell me, again…

"_Where is my breakfast energon!?"_

The Morphing-yearling was far too old to be served energon in bed like some sick Sparkling; his body frame was finally firming up its soft corners while the last silver dredges of his Morphing years were fading away, revealing a blue and white paintjob beneath. Most Morphing-Yearlings were supposed to be old enough to get up and get their own breakfast, but oh, no, not _this_ Morphing-yearling, not _this_ not-so-little-heir to fame and fortune. Oh ho, no, for this was Baron-in-waiting Mirage, a mech who had had everything his Spark desired in his life cycle. Except the love and respect of the house servants, and right now, the femme he had just finished yelling at looked like she wished that she were a mere drone that way she wouldn't care about the boy's whining.

"M-Master Mirage," the servant femme said, one of her optics twitching, "M-Master Vision has given specific orders to ration the energon. There appears to be a barricade to town preventing us from going in and getting more supplies—"

"I'll have a word with my father," Mirage snapped, getting out of bed and stalking past the femme and out of the room.

With the spoiled brat gone, the femme growled in frustration and smacked a palm to her head.

Young Mirage transformed into an expensive, though useless, speedster wheeled car and took off through the halls, purposefully leaving skid marks wherever he could. He enjoyed seeing the house servants cleaning up after him; it made him feel powerful.

He knew where to find his father-unit and was correct: In the main guest parlor, where the parties were usually held. At this time in the morning, the sun was allowed to stream in through the enormous windows to light up the room. Lavishly decorated, wired-back furniture pieces and intricately woven metal tables adorned the floor. On the walls, large, proud portraits made from expensive, imported organic substances hung, picturing Mirage's ancestors. The main portrait was a pink and red femme. This femme was Master Mirage's mother-unit, who had been lost due to sickness. But the ever-wise, all-knowing servants often whispered of a tale of passion where Mistress Cherrystone had fallen in love with another mech and fled away with him.

Below Cherrystone's portrait was the house's coat of arms: A pair of crossing flails over a circle. Many a guest had looked at the flails with confusion, as they were a bizarre and rare sort of weapon to be seen, much less used in one's coat of arms. Few even knew what they were. But they served the purpose of creating mysterious, respectful awe and hence, were the coat of arms.

Now, Mirage spotted a mech that was practically his clone, if not older, standing with his hands clasped behind his back as he stared at the forest land beyond. In one of his hands, he carried a sort of smoking pipe; a hobby Mirage had never understood, never cared for. He liked hunting better than sucking tainted air into his air cooling systems.

Mirage's father, Master Vision, turned when he heard his son skidding into the parlor and transform. Other than the mustache-like extension under his nose unit, he was identical to Mirage, just older.

"What is it, Mirage?" he asked.

"The servant femme said that I couldn't have energon!" Mirage whined. "Daddy, she's trying to starve me, fire her!"

Where others felt frustration and disgust at Mirage's antics, Vision only found hilarity and amusement. He expressed this now as he laughed, patting Mirage on the shoulder comfortingly.

"Ah, Mirage," Vision chuckled. "It's not like that at all! You see, The Decepticons have been causing quite a ruckus in the surrounding lands with the Autobots and every time I send mechs out to refill the cabinets, they wind up being picked off. So I'm just keeping us isolated until this matter all blows over. I don't feel like giving any more people apology funds for the loss of their loved ones."

"No more food?" Mirage exclaimed, "We'll starve!"

"We have enough energon in our storages to last us all four months, with careful consumption, my boy."

"I'll be reduced to a silver stick!"

"Oh, stop being so melodramatic," Vision scolded. "Here is something to keep your processor busy. Just stay well with in our borders."

From a couch Vision picked up a long, narrow box and offered it to Mirage. The Morphing-Yearling yipped excitedly as he opened the box, tossing the lid aside. With in was a long rifle made of well-polished metals and plastics. Mirage cheered as he spun the gun about in his hands and held it in a perfectly balanced position. While Mirage was a brat and a bit of a puss, he was far from stupid and, indeed, excelled in the art of hunting and any weapons concerned with it.

"An X6O Sharp Point Shooter!" he gasped, "They only made _thirty _of these! Look at that, perfect balance, straight sight, and farther shooting distance! Father, this must have cost an arm and a leg!"

"Indeed it did," Vision agreed, puffing at his pipe. A small stream of purple and green smoke emitted from the pipe. "Credit Corner has been failing and all that, but I predict that business is about to get better soon. _Much_ better."

Mirage looked at his father-unit curiously, but Vision stared back at him, then at the door as he shrugged.

"Well? What are you waiting for? Go test it out!"

"Thanks, dad!" Mirage called with genuine care, transforming down with the gun strapped to his roof and sped away, this time failing to leave streaks on the floor. Mirage was a brat, but he still loved his father-unit and could have his moments.

Vision smiled and waved his son a goodbye. He turned and stared out the window, looking out to the trees whose trunks were made of some sort of super-hard rubber and their leaves with diamond-shaped leaflets. After a while, he saw Mirage speeding off in the distance, into the woods. He hummed in approval, nodding, and turned to a small table where a communicator unit was set. He pressed a few buttons, activating a call. When the calling tones stopped, indicating an answer, he did not wait for a greeting.

"I am ready for business," he simply stated.

The person on the other line hung up.

- - - -

Mirage's scanners spotted a small family of turbo-foxes a few yards ahead of him. He had been hunting all day, and while he normally would start complaining after the first _five minutes _of walking on his own feet in any other circumstances, hunting was a different matter all together for him. When he hunted, he was more than happy to get scratched, muddied, and busted up, all in the name of the chase. Now, he crouched in the bushes, fixing his optics on the family of four-legged creatures with their bristly, energon-emitting tails. With some careful concentration, the outlines of a glowing chamber appeared around him, then disappeared. To himself, he was perfectly visible. To a by-stander, Mirage merely faded from sight.

In his invisible state, Mirage quietly inched forward, getting closer to the turbo-foxes. When he was in range, he knelt, placing his gun up to his shoulder and squinting one optic as he carefully aimed…

- - - -

Vision was sitting in one of the chairs of the main guest parlor, legs crossed as he puffed on his pipe, when a servant femme rolled in on her wheel-footed stand, jittering like a can in the wind.

"M-m-m-m-m-m-Master V-v-v-v-Vision!" she stammered. "Y-Y-Y-Y-You have a g-g-g-g-g-guest…"

"I have been expecting him," Vision said without looking up. "Let him in."

The femme's shaking only grew worse as she rolled off. A moment later, Vision heard the doors opening and the femme stuttering to someone on the other side. Her stuttering was cut short by a bang and the clatter of metal hitting the floor. Vision grimaced distastefully and made his unhappiness known to his guest when they entered the main parlor.

"You will have to pay for her, you know," he said, "It's becoming awfully hard to get a good servant around here."

"You can deal with one less femme caterwauling about the place," his guest said as they crossed the room.

"Well, welcome to my humble abode, Megatron," Vision said as his guest sat across from him.

A butler rushed in and set a tray of a pitcher of energon and cups on the small table beside Vision before rushing away. Had the mechs to turn their heads, they would have seen him all-out running away. But Vision failed to notice this, keeping to propriety by keeping his optics on his own business as he set his pipe aside and poured himself a cup of energon. The cup was shaped like two pyramids connected in the center of the cup by their tips and widened at either end.

"Shall we go through the formalities or cut straight to business?"

"Business," Megatron stated, "I am a _very_ busy mech, Vision."

"Of course you are, what, with the war, massive genocide and all," Vision said dismissively. "Which is my main priority in this transaction: The fees I pay you are supposed to guarantee safety to my land and all who live in and on it. In spite of this agreement, several of my grocery fetchers have already been killed by your mechs. I truly hope that this is just a slip up of that rabid fiend you call a second-in-command, Starscream."

"Starscream _has_ been 'slipping up' around your grocery fetchers, but with my consent," Megatron replied. "You see, your _fees_ have been, shall we say, _degrading_, along with the Credit Corner, these past few weeks. With _my_ interfering, it's a miracle that there's any sort of credit passing between mechs and merchants in these times. As the worth of the credit goes down, so does the worth of one's word bound by them."

"So the price for protection has increased, fine, fine. Name your new price and I shall match it."

"Oh, you silly fool," Megatron chuckled darkly, making Vision finally look up. "Didn't anyone tell you? The economy can't support itself in such times. It, and the Credit Corner, has collapsed."

The gears in Vision squeaked in terror. His optics widened and his fingers clutched his cup tightly, cracking it.

"T-then what do you want?" he asked. "I-I have more than enough riches to pay; rare portraits, hard-to-find parts, vehicles, whatever you want, it's yours, but please, don't harm my household!"

"Ah, poor, poor Vision," Megatron snickered, aiming his arm cannon at Vision. "I want it _all_, _including _your life."

Vision dropped his cup, throwing his hands up in protest. But a flash of purple light lit the room and a gun shot rang out. Vision screamed in pain, falling out of his chair as he clutched his ruined knee cap. The cup he had dropped shattered as it hit the ground.

Humming a small tune, Megatron stood and poured himself a glass of energon, ignoring Vision as he writhed on the floor, groaning in pain. Megatron gulped a large part of the energon down before setting the cup down, whipping his mouth off as he went over to the mantle. He activated his hover abilities and floated up, pulling one of the flails away from the family coat of arms.

"Is that your wife-unit?" Megatron asked, glancing up at the portrait of Cherrystone as he examined the flail. "Pretty thing, you must have been traumatized when she died. But don't worry…"

He landed and strode calmly over to Vision, flail dangling in hand.

"You should be with her soon. By the way, what _is_ this thing? I've never seen a craft quite like it. Here, get a closer look."

Megatron swung the weapon whose name he did not know and slammed the spiked ball down at Vision's head.

- - - -

"Stupid turbo-foxes," Mirage grumbled, walking down the road leading to the family mansion, "I was invisible _and_ silent, so how did they know I was there?"

His private rant against the sneaky turbo-foxes was abandoned when he heard a series of jet engines roar. He looked up and saw only a series of blurry craft zipping through the air overhead. Curious, he shouldered his new Sharp Point Shooter and bolted forward, racing to his mansion. Perhaps his father was entertaining some military personnel? He tended to do that often these days. Vision always told Mirage to go away or go to his room when they visited, too.

A few minutes later, Mirage was coming to the top of the final hill before the mansion when he heard a great rumble of engines. He stopped short in shock in time to see an entire stampede of vehicle-form Transformers charging over the hill, racing right past Mirage.

"_What_ the--!?" he exclaimed.

One of the brawnier butlers, the same that had set Vision's energon drink before him, came over the hill, clutching the hand of the femme who had encountered Mirage at breakfast time. As they ran by, the butler grabbed Mirage's arm.

"Come, Master Mirage, we must flee!" the butler exclaimed.

"What, why? What's happening?" Mirage exclaimed, struggling out of the butler's arm. "I shouldn't be treated this way, let go! What kind of servants are you to leave my father and your posts??"

Before he could get an answer, he charged up the last bit of hill and came to its top, finally looking down at the family mansion. What he saw made him pull up hard with a horrified gasp.

The mansion had been a beautiful one, made by one of the legendary names of architecture—what was he, Maple? Grabby? Garble? Lapel? Grapple? It had been shaped somewhat like a long oval stuck half-way into the ground, with tall, narrow towers connected by intricately decorated widow walks and adorned with statues of wonderfully crafted warriors of old and fictional creatures. But now, purple and orange flames slithered out of the windows and pawed at the outer walls like demons trying to escape the possessed house. Smoke drifted into the sky, darkening it. Among the smoke flew numerous unidentified Transformers who, lit from the flames below and concealed by smoke, seemed more like foreign entities, tricks of the mind meant to make little Sparklings tremble in fear. But Mirage _did_ tremble at the sight. His home, his palace, the place had always seen himself inheriting and ruling over, was in flames.

"Dad…" he whispered.

Mirage took a step forward, preparing to transform and race to the mansion to rescue his father, but the butler from before appeared behind him, wrapping his arms around Mirage and hauling the young mech clear up off his feet. Mirage screamed in protest, but the butler ignored him, taking Mirage away from the fighting and his only home as it burned.

- - - -

"So… what do we do now?" one of the servants asked later when the survivors had found a safe place on the road to hide.

"I know a cousin in the canyons who can take me in," the brawny butler who had saved Mirage said. "I'm going to go there and hole-up with him until things get better. Who wants to come with me?"

Three other mechs wanted to come with him. That left six mechs and a mute, distant-staring Mirage.

"We'll go to the Autobot base near by," one of the six mechs said. "We have no where else to go, and nothing better to do. It's only about a mile from here."

"Alright, good luck," the butler replied. "Hey, kid- Mirage, are you coming with us or what?"

Mirage didn't answer.

"Alright then," the butler said, shrugging as he turned away, "Suite yourself."

He had walked a distance up the road when he heard Mirage call, "Wait!"

The butler turned and waited for Mirage to run up to him.

"How far is it to the canyon?" Mirage panted.

"Five days drive, at least," the butler replied. "But if we have to stick to hiding and move around the obstacles and Decepticon-occupied towns, eh, twenty, maybe more."

"You'll need this," Mirage said, giving the butler his Sharp Point Shooter. "To defend yourself."

The butler took the gun, clearly surprised at this unusual token of gratitude. Everyone else had to do a double take. The Mirage _they _knew was more apt to taking than giving. Had the loss of his home and father-unit really changed the spoiled brat into a real mech? Maybe; war changed everybody.

"Kid," the butler said, holding the gun out, "I can't take this!"

"Yes, you can," Mirage growled. "As my final order as Baron Von Mirage of the B:16 Energon Mines and Ranch, I'm _ordering _you to take it and defend yourself."

The butler stared at Mirage for a minute, then a smile twitched at his mouth as he shouldered the gun.

"Okay, kiddo, suite yourself," he chuckled, turning away. "Good luck and watch over yourself, 'kay?"

"I will," Mirage replied.

He stood where he was, watching the butler's group walk down the road, around the bend, and disappeared from sight. Behind him, the party heading to the Autobot base got up and transformed, driving down a separate road.

"Master Mirage, are you coming with us?" one of the mechs called.

Mirage sighed and rolled his optics as his shoulders drooped. Turning, he strutted over to the other mechs. The mechs waiting for him felt mild annoyance, and yet, welcome familiarity when they saw the mech's pompous attitude return.

"Fine," he sniffed, "Though I honestly don't think fighting is for me. I mean, I'm a huntsman, but I'm more of _officer material_, don't you know? Perhaps I can just _convince_ someone to allow me to hang out at the base, as oh, I don't know--"

_"You're gonna shoot slaggers with the rest of us! Now get down on all four wheels and move it, scrap head!!!" _one of the mechs bellowed and Mirage meekly complied.

**Author's Note: And requests are… done! Sorry, no more requesting origins because I'm running out of ideas and it's time to wrap this puppy up. Next: You've wondered, you've prodded, and now you get his origins (or at least what I think of it): The big O-P himself! Check in soon!**


	23. Optimus Prime Part 1

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Author's Note****: You've asked for him, you've wondered about him, and I **_**finally**_** got an idea for him! This was also partially inspired by the G1 episode, where Megatron made a copy of Optimus, and he referred to Optimus as a gladiator.**

**Chapter 23: Optimus Prime (Part 1)**

His name was Optronix, first and foremost. It wasn't a name referring to some other item, like a mechanical part or concept as were most Transformers, but a truly old, unique Transformer name. The meaning of his name was controversial. Some said that it meant "star warrior", others claimed "honor", and still more claimed it meant "good sight". From they who feared his strength, it was the name of the guardian of Eternity; a god or goddess from some religion lost in the passage of time. The reason the fearful ones called him Eternity's Guard was that the original Eternity's Guard was not always a good mech.

What ever his name meant, it was known by all who lived on Kyron 4. People feared and loved him, and became awe or terror struck in his presence. It wasn't because he was a large mech of handsomely strong build, or the horn-like helmet adornments clearly marking him as a dying breed of strong, powerful Transformers. No, the reason for his reputation was his identity: Most of the time he hauled cargo from one factory to the other on Kyron 4, hauling more, heavier cargo than any other hauler over longer distances. But cargo-hauling had low respects and an even lower credit pay check, especially in these trying economical times when the Decepticons were destroying entire systems of the economy on their rampage of destruction.

To earn the credit and respect his day-time job stole from him, he fought in the gladiator ring, Kyron 4's main source of entertainment.

- - - -

"Femmes and mechs!" the announcer began, "Thank you all for joining us on this lovely night for yet another _exciting_ gladiator fight between Kyron 4's toughest and finest! First, we have a mech with seven fights and four wins in his possession, with a right hook capable of knocking the biggest of us out cold and knocking the face plate off of the rest. Coming from the eastern gate, here for the eight night in a row, is Copperfist!"

From the eastern gate: An average-enough looking Transformer with a metal hide and over-sized fists to match his name. A bug-horn-like protrusion from his helmet added to his own uniqueness. The crowds filling the gladiator stadium's seats and clamoring for a perch in the rafters of the ceiling over head cheered and roared, gunning their engines and whooping in approval.

"And, from our western gate, is a name we all know and love—or hate, depending on whether or not you've fought him—with the longest career in Kyron 4 gladiator history of _forty-seven_ fights on his record and making a win out of everyone of 'em, with _fourteen_ being one-shot KO's! Keep your hands and feet out side of the ring and get ready to pick up parts when they start flying, because here comes… _Optronix!!!"_

The crowd's voice reached wild volumes, becoming out-right screaming in some places. Over head, some of the mechs in the rafters fell off their perches in excitement and had to hastily assume air-craft form to regain their perches before they were stolen. From the western gate came their idol.

Tall, broad-shouldered, and strong, it was rare to find such a hansom mech at such a size. He was red with blue gloves, boots, helmet, and pelvis areas with white everywhere else. Three tall spikes grew from either audio-receptor unit, but whether they were a means of defense or actual antennae no one had ever had the gears to ask the mech directly. An orange-metal battle axe hung in one hand, glittering under the arena lights. A silver face mask hid the majority of his face plate, but his golden yellow optics could be seen fixing them selves on Copperfist. A flicker of fear darted behind Copperfist's yellow optics, but was forced aside as the bell rang out and the commentator ordered the fight.

"You're going down, Optronix!" Copperfist roared, charging forward with one fist raised.

"No, I am not," Optronix stated.

He side-stepped the charging mech. With his free hand, he grabbed the back of Copperfist's armor and yanked him clear off his feet before tossing him into the center of the arena. Copperfist landed on his back and skidded along the dirt road. There were sympathetic groans from the audience as Copperfist coughed and sat up. Optronix approached Copperfist at a leisure pace and Copperfist's fans began to scream encouragement.

Copperfist looked up and gasped when Optronix stopped over him, holding his axe with both hands over head. Copperfist rolled over and kicked at the back of Optronix's knees. Optronix buckled a little, but flipped his axe over and turned, swatting the handle into the side of Copperfist's helmet. Copperfist fell back hard on his back end as energon sprung from a crack in his helmet. Optronix stood tall again and glared down at his opponent as he sat on the ground.

"You are young," Optronix said, "A mere Morphing-yearling in his last stretches of maturing. But I've seen _Sparklings_ your age. I do not fight children."

He stepped back and turned to the audience, about to announce Copperfist's illegibility to fight on the grounds of being under aged. But Copperfist sprung to his feet and swung at Optronix again. Optronix caught the fist, and _then_ turned to looked at Copperfist with his optics flashing. Copperfist swallowed nervously, realizing his mistake too late.

Optronix shoved Copperfist back hard enough to slam him into the arena wall. Before Copperfist's feet had even reunited with the ground, Optronix darted forward and slammed his axe with both hands into the wall. Copperfist emitted a scream of terror and flinched, shutting off his optics. There was a similar shout of surprise from the audience and a sudden silence. When Copperfist realized that he couldn't feel his processor spilling out of his helmet, he dared to online his optics again, only to find his face plate mere inches from Optronix's. Optronix had slammed his axe into the wall just over Copperfist's head, emphasizing how much larger the cargo hauler was to the Morphing-yearling.

Copperfist stared into Optronix's glaring optics as his mouth worked uselessly. After a long moment, he put a shaky arm up to his neck, supporting his chin with its lower portion; the signal for defeat.

Enraged shouts and triumphant, admiring cheers alike rang out from the audience and the commentator announced Optronix as the winner. Optronix yanked on his axe, pulling it from the wall with a small shower of rock and concrete. Copperfist sank to a sitting position on the ground and began to rock and back and forth a little. His zoned-out optics snapped up at Optronix when he spoke.

"Do yourself a favor, boy," he growled, "_Don't_ come back until you're an adult."

With that said, he turned and left the defeated, and probably traumatized, Morphing-yearling on the ground.

- - - -

Most gladiators had at least _one _fan to greet them when they came out of a fight, stalling them before they picked up their reward money. But Optronix had been elevated above the status of such welcoming parties and hence, had no one waiting for him when he left the arena. The reward giver passed Optronix a box through a hole in the iron mesh protecting his booth. Optronix opened it, counted the credits with in, and looked at the reward giver.

"I was contracted to have seven hundred credits for a win," he said, "Why are there only two hundred?"

"Times are tough," the reward giver grunted. He went on with a more respectful tone, remembering who he was speaking to, "The Credit Corner's collapsed with such a messed up economy flow and credits are useless, anyway. The rest of Kyron 4 is already starting to exchange energon for whatever they need. Make sure to use energon instead of credits, next time!"

"Will do," Optronix grunted, pocketing his reward and transforming.

Optronix's cargo hauler form was somewhat old fashioned, but it was strong and large, like him. Not only did people leave him alone in the gladiator ring, but on the roads, too. The reward giver raised his eye brows at seeing the massive trailer that sprouted from nowhere to hook onto him. Most mechs' spare parts went into a small sub-space pocket when they transformed. It was an impressive feat of strength for one to be able to store an entire trailer in their sub-space pocket.

Without a word, Optimus drove out of the tunnel leading into the gladiator pit, coming out to an endless, barren planet surface. Kyron 4 was in the end of its 22 day-long night cycle now, with the stars over head and a yellow glow on the eastern border. Just a few more hours and the planet would finally return to day, staying like that for 22 days before it went back to night and it all started all over again.

Kyron 4, unlike its big-brother planet, Kyron 5, was purely and truly flat. It was a freak accident of cosmic formation, to be sure, but it allowed a Transformed to drive along at a leisure pace without having to worry about running over any boulders if they strayed off the road while staring at the sky. But Optronix ignored the navy blue blanket scattered with silver shavings over his head, and certainly paid no attention to the distant Kyron 5, a light brown orb capable of fitting into one's palm at this distance. Instead, he concentrated on the beaten-down, unpaved road on his quest to return to his private shack before that _one _Sparkling—

"Hiya, Optimistic!" a cheery female voice cheeped.

Optronix groaned in annoyance as a little, five-wheeled peach and yellow craft raced up to drive beside him. A bystander seeing the enormous cargo hauler and tiny wheel craft would instantly feel the impulse to rescue the cute, little craft before the massive trailer rolled over and squished her. But Optronix, like most large-framed mechs, had made an art of delicacy around those smaller than them and hence, neglected to roll over the tinier driver and turn her into a piece of sheet metal, in spite of his deepest desires to do so.

"Tepee, we've been through this: My name is _Optronix_," Optronix growled through gritted teeth plates.

"But optimistic is close enough!" Tepee giggled.

"No, it is not."

"Yes it is! Op-tron-ick-s; Op-tim-uhs---" She stopped pronouncing "optimistic" in the middle of the word to change the subject, "Hey, did you win your fight?"

"You know I always do. Now go home; your father-unit it probably worried sick about you."

"He told me to go bug someone else, so…" The little craft spun about, flashing her headlights cheerfully, "Ta daa!"

"H-Hey, don't do that, you'll crash!" Optronix exclaimed, backing up nervously.

"Daddy said I can do what ever I want now that I can transform, so there!" Tepee stated. "Nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, nah, you can't boss me around!"

"Why couldn't your mentality have matured unnaturally fast and not your body?" Optronix groaned. "Well, if you can do what you want, then you better _want_ to leave me alone before I lock you in my trailer!"

"Ooh, really?" Tepee asked, zooming in dangerously close to Optronix's trailer, "I've always wanted to know what's inside!"

Optronix pulled up to a stop and Tepee followed suit. He transformed into his robot form, kneeling on the ground, and his trailer disappeared into mid-air. He covered his optics with one hand as he heaved a large, annoyed sigh.

Tepee transformed, as well, becoming a tiny, five-foot peach-yellow femme with a round-cornered helmet coming back to a soft point with an extension like a short cape at her shoulders. She was going to be a Cassetticon, it could already be told, and Optronix couldn't wait for the day a handler would take her, that way she could bug someone _else_. That, and she could probably have a better future than wasting her life on a worthless rock like Kyron 4.

"Tepee," Optronix said, dropping his hand to brace on his knee as he stared into the distance ahead of him, "We've known each other for a long time, right?"

"Yeah, ever since you found me alone at the shuttle station and got me home! Tee hee, remember how I got stuck in your armor because I was so tiny?"

"My point is that we've known each other for a long time," Optronix went on. "So, why haven't you gotten the idea yet that I just want to be left alone?"

"Because you haven't kicked me to the other side of Kyron 4?"

"You would shatter the instant my boot touched you. Besides, even a brute like me has standards, Teepee."

"You're not a brute, you're just a big tough guy with a soft Spark!"

"How do _you_ know?" Optronix demanded.

"Because you let me do this."

Before Optronix could stop her, Tepee scrambled up Optronix's leg and came to hug his neck. Optronix's hands fluttered up, as if to brush the little one off, but he sighed and allowed his hands to drop and slump his shoulders as he gazed to the sky warily, begging for help from a higher power. After a minute, Tepee dropped down from Optronix and strutted away playfully.

"Can't you go bug someone else?" Optronix growled.

"Nope; you're too much fun."

If there had been a wall with in walking distance, Optronix would have banged his head into it.

"Optronix, is what everyone say true?" Tepee asked. "That you're actually the Sparkling of a Transformer femme and a Primus-blessed warrior that got left behind here?"

"No, Tepee, it's not," Optronix stated bluntly. "I grew up as an orphan here on Kyron 4 helping the cargo haulers who found my little Sparkling self left at the shuttle station. With my luck, my parent-units were just a couple of spontaneous Morphing-yearlings too young to take care of me."

"Oh, I don't believe that," Tepee said with a dismissive wave, "You're too big and noble for that!"

"You call fighting other mechs for credits and popularity 'noble'?" Optronix snapped, forgetting that he was speaking to a Sparkling of a femme. "I almost killed a Morphing-yearling tonight just because he tried taking a cheap shot at me! How could you _possibly_ be mature enough to judge me?"

Tepee looked at Optronix not with hurt, but with mild confusion at his out burst.

"Optimistic," she said, "I don't need to be old to know that you're good inside. I can see it all over you."

Her naivety broke Optronix's Spark and made his temper cool. What a child; so innocent and good-seeking even in a time where the universe was slowly being eaten alive by civil war. It reminded him why, of the four hundred Transformer residents of Kyron 4, Tepee was the _only_ Transformer he let any where near him.

He decided to change the subject; "You better be careful; you could be mistaken for a lost Cassetticon and wind up in the pound."

"I don't see why we have a pound for Cassetticons, any how," Tepee pouted, "Freedom is a right to all sentient beings, not just big mechs!"

"Unfortunately, it's the big mechs who make the rules and give orders, and I'm now ordering you to scram," Optronix said carelessly.

"Well," Tepee said, transforming back into her alt-mode, "Daddy and I are gonna see my auntie on Kyron 5, anyway. I better go if I wanna catch the shuttle. See ya around, Optimistic!"

"Drive safely now, Tepee," Optronix said as the little one drove away, letting the name slip, "And for Primus' sake, drive safely!"

Tepee beeped in acknowledgement and Optronix remained, watching her go until he could see her no longer. Finally, he transformed and continued on his way.

Two hours later, he had finally gotten to the collection of buildings making up his "home town". With only twenty buildings in all and only a handful more on the out skirts, the town just barely had its necessaries, like a mechanic shop, energon store, and a little bank. It was the bank that attracted mechs more days than not, and on this particular night, there was an unusually large amount of mechs in town collecting around the bank.

Optronix kept to himself, parking outside of the rabble to watch. He saw a distant streak of white rise at a perpendicular angle from the ground many miles away , pointing straight to Kyron 5. It was the light of the space shuttle taking off to Kyron 5, and he mutely pleaded to no one in particular to let it get there safely. Hardly any one went on the shuttle any more, considering that prices were so high that it was cheaper to just harass a Kyron shuttle-Transformer to haul one's self over, even though an official shuttle took less than three-minute trips. Hmm, prices, that reminded Optronix that he had to bank his credits.

He made this decision just in time, as the rabble around the bank was becoming chaotic, with increasing shoving and pushing. When he transformed and approached, the rabble instantly quieted and stilled before piping up into a calmer pace of bustle.

"I'm here to bank come credits," he stated.

"_We're_ here to _get_ our credits," a mech near him grunted, "Guess what? The Credit Corner crashed; credits aren't worth the glowing metal they're made of."

"Crashed?" Optronix asked. "How?"

"Too much damage to the worlds," another ramble-comer said, "Credits have been passing around to fund the military and repair towns, but no one's been making enough credits to repay the debt. No one's been buying because they've been too nervous to, and the economy just crashed."

"So," Optronix said, taking out the reward box and shaking out some credits into it, "What will replace _these_? And what more are they good for?"

"Energon will replace them, I reckon," the first mech that had spoken said, "Everybody needs to keep charged, ya know."

A mech on the other side of Optronix took a credit from him and flipped it over in one hand as he drew his pistol with the other.

"As with _these_?" the credit-take said, "All they're good for is target practice!"

He tossed the diamond-shaped coin high in the air, turning it into a spinning star of purple light in the sky that reached for the distant Kyron 5. The credit-taker aimed his gun upwards and shot, fairly vaporizing the coin. At the same time, an enormous dust cloud appeared on Kyron 5 and a distant boom followed after.

Everybody turned their sights up to the planet, muttering and making exclamations of shock. The credit-shooter looked at the planet and then at his laser pistol, as if contemplating his responsibility for the sudden explosion. Optronix's own optics widened in shock and horror. An explosion cloud that size must be causing immeasurable damage! What in the name of Primus could create such an explosion??

"Wow," some one said in a lull of noise, "One of the energy plants must have gone off."

Several more clouds appeared on Kyron 5, each being followed by a distant boom, appearing in rapid fashion as they got larger and larger until the entire planet was engulfed in brown dirt swirled with black smoke. Flashes of purple and warm colors appeared in side the clouds as even more explosions rang out. Shockwaves from the planet made Kyron 4 trembled beneath the Transformers. All-out screams of terror sounded out now as people realized what was happening.

"Holy Spark!" someone cussed, "Kyron 5 is being destroyed!"

Any one who had seen Kyron 1, 2, or 3 be destroyed when their use had been spent would recognize a planet being detonated. It was an awesome display to watch, but sad and terrifying, as well, like watching a black-hole suck up a ship of garbage. But an inhabited planet like Kyron 5 being destroyed, full of refugees and innocents, with working mines still and its defenses, there was only one force that would dare destroy such a place.

"It's the Decepticons!" Optronix snarled, drawing his axe from his back.

"H-How do you reckon that?" a mech asked shakily.

"Because the Decepticons are like that," Optronix growled, "They destroy mercilessly and without reason."

_Tepee…_

Upon remembering the little one, he felt his Spark splutter and die, leaving his body to grip his axe and glare up at the dying Kyron 5 while in side, his spirit suddenly collapsed. Tepee, darling, stupid, naïve, annoying, adorable, innocent Tepee. She had gone to Kyron 5 today, of all days, to visit her aunt. No one could survive such decimation. How it happened or exactly why did not matter: Genocide in the millions had just happened, right in front of Optronix's optics, and among the thousands and thousands of femmes, Sparklings, Morph-yearlings, and mechs dead, there were the remains of one tiny little femme who had made friends with the roughest mech on her planet.

"What kind of monsters," he said quietly, lowering his axe, "Are the Decepticons to kill thousands of innocents like that _with no reason_?"

"Monsters who kill all who defy them."

Everybody spun around and Optronix raised his axe again. Standing on the roof of the bank was the silhouette of a broad-shouldered mech with a simple helmet and an arm cannon on one arm. The slowly growing twilight of Kyron 4's 22-day day was growing behind the mech, giving him a sickly yellow background to compliment his red optics.

"Planting massive bombs in the major factories of Kyron 5 were easy enough," the mech said, "It was a useless rock, any how. Now," he extended his hands down at the crowd. "Join me, Megatron, and the Decepticons, or perish as Kyron 5 has!"

This.. _This_ was the mech who had caused the genocide in the sky above him? _This_ was the mech who was destroying the very universe he was seeking to conquer? _This _was the mech who killed innocents like Tepee? Who did he think he was!? He had no right!

In response to Megatron's call, Optronix threw out his axe, sending it flying through the air at Megatron's extended hands, one to offer power, the other to offer death. There was the clear zipper-like noise of metal slicing metal and there was a collected gasp when Optronix's axe hit the ground, followed by Megatron's hand and a small rain of energon before repair systems hastily shut up the tubes.

Megatron stared in shock at his missing hand, then down at Optronix as pure, demonic rage twisted up his face plate.

"_Decepticons, attack!"_ he bellowed.

From behind the buildings a force of Decepticons appeared and did battle with the town. Optronix ran forward as the crowd broke up, picking up his axe and stomping on the dismembered hand. In moments, energon filled the air as, like in so many other places in the universe before, war broke out. But Optronix ignored this, instead turning around to face Megatron when the Decepticon landed behind him.

"You took my hand," Megatron growled.

"You took my only friend," Optronix replied.

"Which one would that be?" Megatron asked with a devilish smirk. "I've killed so many that I can't tell one squealing mech from another."

"She was a Sparkling."

"I shoot those brats to shut them up, not look at their faces."

Optronix went postal, swinging his axe in both hands as he charged Megatron. Megatron side-stepped, but Optronix was quick to turn and strike his axe into Megatron's shoulder. Megatron gasped in pain, but gritted his teeth and seized the handle of Optronix's axe with his remaining hand, forcing it over their heads. He whacked the stub of his other arm into Optronix's side with surprising force, making Optronix buckle and step back, yanking his axe away from Megatron.

The two circled each other. No one dared approach him, as if sensing that these two titans were in a private combat too powerful for mere mechs to enter.

Megatron attempted to shoot Optronix with his arm cannon, but Optronix rolled out of the way, coming past Megatron. He came up in a kneeling position and swung his axe backwards, catching Megatron to the back of his legs. Megatron cried out in pain and collapsed to the ground. He shoved himself up as Optronix stood, grabbing the gladiator's leg and yanking him back down. Optronix kicked Megatron in the face repeatedly and scrambled backwards.

A passing Decepticon stopped and attempted to shoot Optronix. Optronix weaved out of the shot and swung his axe up, catching the Decepticon in the side. The Decepticon cried out and gripped his side, but Optronix got to his feet, yanked his axe out, and finished off the Decepticon with a slice to the neck before turning his attention back to Megatron as he got back to his feet.

Megatron shot several times and Optronix ducked and weaved out of the way of them. He slipped on a slick patch of dirt and oil and fell down, but crossed an arm over his face as one of Megatron's shots landed directly on him. Megatron smirked, only to turn his face to shock when the smoke cleared to show Optronix standing tall and unharmed.

"No!" Megatron exclaimed. "My arm cannon _can't_ just be shaken off like that!"

"Yes, it can, Megatron," Optronix snarled, and charged at him.

Megatron flew up in the air, an unexpected and cowardly move, and came right back down to land right on top of Optronix. He pinned Optronix's hands down with his boots as he sat on top of the mech's chest. He wrenched Optronix's axe from his hand and spun it about in his own grip.

"You took my hand," Megatron said coolly, "And I believe that it is time to repay the favor."

The axe swished through the air and thunked into the ground. Optronix cried out in pain as his wrist was set afire with back-firing energy and pain receptors, then suddenly went numb. The axe came back again, slicing through Optronix's face mask and down, chipping his neck before cleaving open his chest. Megatron stood, breaking the axe over his knee. He grunted and bent over, grasping his wounds. He had never felt so much pain and weakness, nor received so much damage, from any Transformer before.

"Decepticons, retreat!" he called, "We are done here!"

The Decepticons complied, transforming and flying off. A red-white and a black-dark blue jet came up on either side of Megatron to help him fly away. Silence followed. Optronix remained on the ground, panting as energon pooled in his wounds and spilled over, gathering a puddle of energon around him. What few people remained from the massacre collected together, trying to revive the wounded and dead. The golden glow of the rising sun burst from the north-eastern horizon and grew brighter as day came. No one approached Optronix and for once, he regretted his solitary life style.

Optronix had lived a selfish life, isolated by his strength and his own resentment at being abandoned. His savagery in the gladiator arena and his anti-social attitude had kept him at a distance from his fellow mechs. Now the only Transformer brave and kind enough to stay near him was gone. He had always felt like he was apart of the masses; just a little stronger.

He stared up into the sky where the dust-ball remains of Kyron 5 were still visible. The dust and smoke were clearing, but he could see that there was not one whole planet, but multiple chunks. There _might _have been survivors on those chunks, but who could tell? Thousands, perhaps millions, of lives had been taken that dawn in someone's cruel quest for power; a someone _he _had fought off and even maimed just minutes before.

Suddenly, he _felt _the contrast between himself and the weak, between himself and the youth like Tepee. He saw the difference between mechs like his gladiator pit audience and himself and even the other mechs he had fought. He saw his abilities. He suddenly realized that he could do far more with his strength than just earn a pay check. He could protect and serve: He could become an Autobot.

He clenched his good hand, tensing himself up, before moving his good hand down to press against the ground, shoving him up into a sitting position. Surviving mechs around him stopped and stared, awed and fascinated by the recovery from such devastating wounds. It was like seeing the dead come back to life. He forced himself to his feet, slowly rising to full height.

He heard a dismayed cry and turned to see that one Morphing-yearling femme was attempting to shove the body of a large mech off of her boyfriend. Optronix strode over, making the femme and pinned mech stare up in surprise and even a little fear at his appearance. Ignoring them, Optronix stopped and pulled on the dead mech, pulling it off of the victim pinned beneath him. As the femme and her mech embraced, Optronix turned to the other staring survivors.

"Attend to the wounded and fallen," he ordered, "When we are ready, we can move out. It's no longer safe here, and we have to move out before the Decepticons can come back and finish the job like they did to Kyron 5."

Optronix was a mere icon of danger to the survivors, but something had changed. They had begun to see a different side to the muscle-bound gladiator and somehow, they knew that they could trust him. So, placing their Sparks and trust in the hands of this disastrously wounded, but capable mech, they followed his orders.

**Author's Note****: Before anyone shouts: Hey, Megatron started good, but ended bad. It seems to make sense, in a cosmic joke kind of way, that Optimus would start bad and end good. Flames will be put out with a fire truck! **


	24. Optimus Prime Part 2

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Chapter 24: Optimus Prime (Part 2)**

Ratchet was finding Hoist to be fine enough for a team mate: Agreeable, obedient, friendly, and good with patients, which made it all the better for Ratchet to give them a good, stabilizer-fixing electrocution. Wheeljack, on the other servo, was proving to be down right annoying and-or terrifying.

"We _do not_ have the spare metal to give soldiers up grades!" Ratchet snapped at Wheeljack across the table. "Every bit _needs_ to go to repairing ships and mechs!"

"Come on, Ratchet, do you _really _think that we can afford to be so _traditional _when the Decepticons are blowing up planets left and right?" Wheeljack replied, "They blew up _Kyron 5_, for Primus' sake! If we don't start dishing some heavy damage back onto the Decepti-creeps soon, we're _all _scrap metal!"

"Kyron 5 couldn't be saved with upgrades; it was a bombing stealth force that strategically placed their explosives in the biggest energon storage chambers they could find. No upgrades could have stopped them!"

"But what about the icing substance I put in that Ironhide guy, or Blurr's speed, or even my shoulder gun? If we had just had those kind of mechs patrolling the storages, we could have _stopped _the Decepticons and five million lives wouldn't be going to the All Spark now!"

"Can we perhaps lower our voices a bit, _please_?" Hoist pleaded.

"When mechs get too dependent on upgrades, they get cocky and reckless and _sloppy_!" Ratchet yelled at Wheeljack. "And your stuff blows up too much!"

In moments, the repair room was filled with the three mechs' arguing voices. They hardly even noticed when Squad Leader Prowl entered the room.

"Hey!" he shouted over them, "We just got a party of refugees from Kyron 4 in dire need of repair, so knock it off and fix them!"

The medics did not acknowledge Prowl's presence. He left the medics arguing and gestured for someone to come in. A mech entered and the voices pretty much stopped in shock. The sliced face mask, gashed-open chest armor, and the missing servo: it was a miracle that such a large mech could even walk on his two, steady feet. Someone had welded large sheets of dirty scrap metal over the chest wound, but it was a sloppy, inexperienced, and even painful looking fix. At least it had done the job to keep the mech's engine with in his body.

"Uh… on the table," Ratchet said.

The medics and inventor stepped back respectfully as their mech came and lied down on the table.

"I'm going to give you a minor shock to knock you out," Ratchet said, drawing a tool from the table beside him, "It'll help with the repair. Is that alright?"

The large mech merely nodded and Ratchet applied the shock. When the mechs' engines were quietly humming in an off lien mode, Ratchet turned his attention to Wheeljack.

"He's going to need a replacement arm," he whispered. "Get some measurements and go get one in his size. Hoist, help me fix his chest plate. Holy Primus, this guy is banged up…"

- - - -

The hissing of medical equipment was what brought him back online. Opening his optics, the world looked blurry and he could only see a couple of blurry white shapes over him.

"How are you feeling?" one of the blurs asked.

"I can't see well," he groaned.

"Oh," the same blur said, reaching out.

Something tapped him on the side of the head and the image flickered before things came into startling focus. He was lying on his back on a bed with two mechs over him. He could see that the crudely welded-over wound in his chest and face mask had been repaired into a pristine condition. The mech on his right was red and white with a red horn-like badge on his forehead. The one on his left was a white mech accented with the green and red colors of an official inventor, bearing a face mask and a pair of large ear fin lights. Both bore Autobot insignias.

"There, better?" the mech on his left asked.

"Yeah," he groaned, shifting his sore, stiff body. "What happened? Where am I?"

"What happened, according to the band of misfits you came in with, was that you single handedly led a band of forty mechs half way across the galaxy, through a dozen Decepticon attacks and countless wilderness obstacles, just to get to the Autobot headquarters here on Cybertron ," the mech on his right said. "_And_ you fought the rebel leader, Megatron! Now that's a cup of energon to brag about!"

Remembering the fight, he lifted his right arm, expecting to see a mere stub where his hand had once been. In his weeks of leading the band of survivors, he had learned to get used to his lack of a hand, seeing it as something to remember Megatron by. But instead, all he saw was his hand; as flawless as it had always been. Only the extra sheen in it gave fact that it had been repaired.

"My hand!" he exclaimed, sitting up.

"Oh, yeah," the white-red-green mech said, "We decided to fix _that_. Ratchet here fixed it up and I made sure to eh heh, _upgrade _it…"

"I really wish you hadn't done it, Wheeljack," Ratchet growled as their patient looked his hand over. "Knowing _your_ 'upgrades', it'll implode or something by the end of the week."

Detecting a new transforming ability, their patient activated it. He jerked in surprise when his hand had retreated into his red arm and out had sprouted an energon axe.

"Oh, wow…" he whispered.

"Some of the mechs you came in with said that you wielded an axe before Megatron trashed it," Wheeljack said, "So I decided that you would be more comfortable with that."

"You were right," he agreed, standing up and giving the axe an experimental swipe. "It's perfect!"

"Great! So, uh, what's your name?"

"No one told you yet?" their patient chuckled.

"Too busy stuffing their faces with energon and taking recharges in all the best booths," Ratchet grumbled.

"My name is Opt—"

"_Tepee, we've been through this: My name __is Optronix__."_

_ "But optimistic is close enough!"_

_ "No, it is not."_

_ "Yes it is! Op-tron-ick-s; Op-tim-uhs---"_

"Optimus," was what popped out. Wait, Optimus, wait, no, did he really want--?

"Well, Optimus, it sounds like you've been doing some pretty nasty damage on the Decepticons," Wheeljack, being the talkative one, went on. "So what d' ya say to joining the Autobots? You seem to be a natural for it!"

Oh, he was a natural for it, all right, in more ways than what Wheeljack could imagine.

"Please, we're begging ya," Ratchet said bluntly, "The Decepticons are trashing us left and right and saying that we could use a mech capable of maiming the Decepticon leader is an understatement."

Optronix, now Optimus, looked down at his new energon axe and spun it about on his wrist.

"The Decepticons have killed too many, including one of my only friends, and seek to enslave any one who doesn't join them or die; an abomination considering that freedom is the right to all sentient beings." He sheathed his axe and his hand popped out again as he turned to the inventor and doctor. "I gladly offer my services to the Autobots," he finished.

Before Ratchet could even so much as sigh in relief, Wheeljack grabbed Optimus' hand and tugged him out of the room, as if worried that the large, mysterious 'bot would run off if he were too slow.

"Great, let's go get you an insignia and registered!" he said hastily, "Woo, is Prowl gonna be glad to hear about the extra muscle around here! By the way, how do you feel about teaming up with a DJ and weapon whacko? Jazz and Ironhide are cool, but they tend to freelance now and then…"

- - - -

Meanwhile, many light years away, in the captain's chamber of a war ship where an eloquent private quarters had been set up, Shockwave stood and examined his handiwork.

"There, Lord Megatron, as good as new," he said, "And with some _upgrades_."

Megatron, sitting on the side of the bed, flexed his new hand and turned it this way and that, testing it. Suddenly, his hand retreated into his arm and a glowing ball of purple light, studded with spikes and connected to him by a chain, popped out of his arm. He reared back a little in something like surprise and confusion.

"What _is _this?" he asked.

"It's an extremely old and primitive weapon called a flail, master. You have merely to swing it and it can do significant damage."

No sooner had Shockwave finished speaking than the spiked ball zipped through the air and crashed into an energon cube on a small table beside the bed, shattering the cube and sending glass and its remaining energon raining to the floor.

"Good work, Shockwave. Now leave."

Shockwave obeyed. When Megatron was alone, he turned his flail back into a hand and got up, walking over to the large window lining half of his quarters and stared out into space. He continued to rub his fixed wrist as he did so.

That mech, the red, white, and blue one, with spiked audio receptors and the strength of ten mechs. _Who _had he been? Some factory worker, a gladiator, a punk, a crime boss, a muscle head? What kind of mech had Megatron run into that was capable of removing _his _hand from _his _arm? It haunted Megatron's processor, to think that such a mech could have easily killed him had he been only a little less experienced in the art of combat.

He saw his reflection in the window; it was becoming gaunt and narrow from exhaustion, stress, and the war in general. But what bothered him as not the gauntness, nor the slightly maddened spark at the corner of his optics, but the fear and uncertainty he saw there. He turned away and looked at the floor, still rubbing his wrist to dull the ache there.

"It… doesn't matter now," he forced himself to say. "The mech is dead. I tore open his Spark Chamber myself, and that is my final word."

Megatron marched out of his private quarters, ready to whip some more lawless cast-offs into shape with his ever confident, dark air of power and strength. But under his mask of bravo, he still felt an ominous voice nibbling at his conscious, telling him that he should have taken extra measures against the unnamed Kyron 4 Transformer.


	25. Hound and Beachcomber

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Chapter 25: Hound and Beachcomber**

Many Transformers had a natural repulsion to organic life, or life forms made of flesh, blood, bone, and cartilage. Perhaps it was the smell, or their process of waste removal, or their many disgusting, yet necessary habits for survival. Maybe it was the mess many organics made when killed violently, with their biological fluids spilling out and all, and how the body just became more and more gross as it decayed. The point being is that a majority of Transformers were disgusted with organic life and were more than happy enough to stay on well-sanitized Cybertron and its accompanying planets.

But there was a faction of Transformers who could look past these awkward facts and see their beauty: The colorful feathers, the soft fur, the beautiful eyes and how they often glowed in the dark. They could also admire the way organic species survived in spite of having several obstacles in life, such as starvation, dehydration, sickness, territorial violence, natural disasters, and predators. Such mechs often became biologists and naturists, such as the green and grey mech sitting in the bushes now, looking out into a field to watch a herd of organic creatures.

These organic creatures had four long, dainty legs carrying their bodies well over ten feet off the ground. Their necks were long and thick, topped with a canine-like head with four tall, straight horns crowning their brows with two horns in front and two longer ones in the back. Their tails were long and thin, ending in a brush that was partially long, hard spikes and partially soft downy-like hairs. The six-eyed creatures grazed on the yellow grass that blended in with their golden fur perfectly, ignoring the strange metal giant near by. He had never given them reason to fear him, and hence he was just a natural part of their life.

The Transformer watching the herd spotted a baby one of the creatures; stumbling over its long legs and tossing its head about as if to threaten someone with its tiny, soft horns. It frequently jumped and bleated in pain when it accidentally struck itself with its spiky tail end. Smiling, the Transformer adjusted a small, gun-like device on his shoulder to aim at the colt. After a moment, the image of a multiple-winged, rainbow-colored insect appeared in the air over the colt's head. The colt bleated happily and gave chase to the insect, bounding and dancing about after it. When the mother crowed for the colt, the insect faded and disappeared from the air. The colt, obeying its mother with the entertainment gone, trotted on back to her.

"Hey, mech, that was some swell trick you did there."

The green Transformer gave a small start and turned to see a blue and white mech coming out of the woods. The new mech had a strange round structure at the back of his head and a visor covering his optics, but his monotone, easy-going voice said that he was friendly.

"Easy; just a little hologram," the green mech replied quietly, not wishing to spook the herd. "I didn't know that other mechs beside my self came to this planet."

"Same here, dude, same here," the other mech said, sitting beside the green one. "Name's Beachcomber. What's your name, brother?"

"Hound," the green mech replied, shaking hands. "So, what brings you here?"

"I'm just chilling and watching the life live and the critters be the sitters and just being one with nature."

Okay, partially creepy, but Hound shook it off.

"You like organic life, too?" he asked.

"Yeah, mech. And you?" Beachcomber asked.

"I _love_ it!" Hound said, leaning forward to peer at the herd, "Transformers gotta put their Sparks in pre-made body shells, but organics do everything with completely nothing! How do they _do_ that? And how does it _feel_? What's it like feeling things as a fleshling? Do they experience pain and pleasure like we do, or feel full like we do? Do they feel different with different emotions? And how do they _see_, anyhow? You'd think that having globs of goo for optics would make it impossible to see stuff because dirt and stuff would get in them!"

"Yeah, mech, yeah," Beachcomber agreed, sitting back on his hands, "And they're so quiet, too. You don't hear a thing about their internals working, or hear anything in 'em jack up when they're mad or upset. It's wild, man, like-like they so cool, you're not even gonna hear 'em workin'."

"Well, there _are_ exceptions," Hound said, pointing. "Look."

Two of the male organic creatures were having a dispute of some sort. They were tossing their heads about as they jumped up and down, stomping the ground with a rapid one-two motion of their front hooves while their long tails snapped about unhappily. From deep with in their chests and stomachs the mechs could hear a low rumbling. Suddenly, the two herbivores charged and locked antlers, beginning a dramatic wrestling match back and forth across an expanse of field. The other herd creatures moved away and occasionally looked up at them, but other wise appeared to be apathetic to the conflict.

"Yeah, man, yeah, I see," Beachcomber confirmed. "But that's wild ya know? I mean, how do they _make_ those noises?"

"Well, I'm a tracker and a land surveyor," Hound sighed. "When someone or something wanders off and needs to be found, I follow their tracks. When mechs want to know what they need to clear out of an area so that they can build on it, I go in and see what's there. I'm no biologist, which is a pity because I've always been fascinated with the organic body. I just couldn't pass science class. How about you; what do _you_ do?"

"I'm a studier. I roam the galaxy, just looking and watching and admiring the beauty of the organic worlds."

. . .

"You're a moocher, aren't you?"

"It ain't like that, man! People invite me in and I just chill until they get heated."

"Why don't you have a job and your own place?"

"I, eh, got a little problematic in school, but it's all cool now—"

"You got your circuits fried on energon, didn't you?"

"I can learn how to speak creature's languages, and I learn stuff from 'em, too."

As if to demonstrate, he suddenly made a series of crowing, hooting noises to the fighting males. What ever he said convinced the males to break up their fight, looking about as if embarrassed, and go back to grazing.

"Nice!" Hound whistled.

"It is," Beachcomber agreed. "But lately it's been harder and harder for me to find any peace with nature. The Decepticons keep popping up and hashing everything up by blowing and burning stuff down to get energon. It's a down right shame, I tell you."

"Oh, yeah, the Decepticons. They're why I'm here, actually. Darn Decepticons took out the city I worked in and I've been hiding out here, trying to figure out what to do next. My original war refugee plan was to Kyron 5, but, well, you know…"

An awkward pause followed; neither wanted to all-out vocalize the fate of Kyron 5. It seemed far too soon after such a tragedy to speak so openly about it without being rude.

"Anyway," Hound rushed on. "I decided to come here and have been pretty much squatting here, trying to figure out about what to do now. I _could_ go to my aunt's, but she's always bugging me to settle down and get a Sparkling. I _could_ go to my parent-units, but my father-unit is an army retiree and does _not_ approve of my organic-studying hobbies. And my mother-unit wants me to settle down and get a Sparkling. I _do_ have a good femme friend, but she wants me to…"

"Settle down and get a Sparkling," the two chimed together.

One had only to give these two cubes of energon and put them on a porch somewhere and they could be good friends already. They had scarcely met for half an hour, but already they were becoming close.

"Yeah, you get my point," Hound said.

"Man, that bites, brother," Beachcomber sighed. "I'm a just gonna keep wandering until everyone just mellows out. Just…" He made a smoothing-out gesture with his hands, "_mellows_ out."

"I don't think that it'll work like that," Hound said. "I think these Decepticons are _serious_ about taking over. They're destroying planets left and right to flush out their enemies, they're shanghaiing mechs into their army, and they're stealing and plundering where ever they can. They're not going to 'mellow out'." He mimicked Beachcomber's gesture. "Looks like all we can do is either fight or run."

"That bites, man," Beachcomber whined. Suddenly, "Hey, do ya see that? What's that?"

"That" was a new beast that came leaping from the forest, scattering the startled herd of organic herbivores. It was a large brute, even by Transformer standards, with long, spindly front arms ending in large claws and cricket-like back legs. The body was long and lithe with flexing spikes on its spine and a scaly head with a muzzle. The four-eyed beast was covered in dark blue and black skin and scales, screeching and yapping a war cry as it come on the hunt as it chased after one of the herbivores.

Hound remained sitting on the ground, used to this display, while Beachcomber, startled, scrambled to his feet. Before Beachcomber could act, the predator leaped on one of the herd grazers, wrapping its long arms twice around the herbivore's neck and biting into it. The herbivore reared up, bleating unhappily one last time, before falling hard on its side, dead. Two more predators rushed from the woods and joined in the feasting and Beachcomber could only watch in shock. The other herd creatures scattered into the forest around the meadow, escaping the predators.

Hound watched the display with a blank face, but he was actually repulsed and even a bit sad. He knew that organics eating organics was apart of their life style and that he couldn't intervene, but he still felt horribly guilty when he saw a beautiful herd-grazer suddenly be taken down by a predator so quickly and mercilessly.

He zoomed in on the gruesome feast in time to catch the full sight of the main predator. The predator, hunched over its prey's neck, looked up and glared at Hound, daring him to _try_ and taking its meal. Looking between the main predator's head and the dead herbivore, whose eyes stared into the sky lifelessly, Hound realized something. The predator's eyes were red and the herbivore's eyes were blue.

_Nah ah,_ Hound told himself. _It's just coincidence. It couldn't—_

Suddenly, a terrified bleat filled the air and everyone, predators and Transformers alike, turned to it. The same colt Hound had been playing with earlier was stumbling about clumsily, as newborns do, and was crying out for its mama. The predators, spotting an easy meal, got up from their meal, sinking low to the ground as they stalked to the colt.

"Dude, the baddie boys are gonna eat the little one!" Beachcomber said as Hound got to his feet. "That ain't right, Hound!"

"You're right," Hound agreed, aiming his hologram caster near the colt. "You distract the predators while I lead the colt away."

"Right!" Beachcomber said before he trotted off to intercept the predators.

With a little concentration, Hound managed to beam an extraordinarily real-looking image of a herd female in the air. Shorter and paler than a male, the female herd grazer's horns were small and soft-tipped and her tail end had no spikes. He made the fake female dance and stomp the ground near the colt, beckoning the babe to it. The colt, recognizing a mothering figure, bleated happily and stumbled towards the fake female.

Meanwhile, the predators snarled and reared up unhappily at Beachcomber.

"Chill, man, chill," Beachcomber told the predators softly. "Be cool, man, be cool."

The main predator snarled something in its own language like "I do _not_ want to be cool!" and leaped up at Beachcomber. Beachcomber cried out as he fell back onto his back, letting the predator bite the arm he used as a shield. He actually yelled in pain when the predator's surprisingly strong bite splintered into the metal. The other two predators came to his sides, biting into his shoulder and leg and wrapping their long arms around their targets to gain a proper hold.

Hound led the colt towards the woods. Upon reaching the woods, the real mother of colt appeared, bleating and licking her colt gratefully. As the mother led her babe away, Hound dissipated the image of the fake mother and turned his sights on Beachcomber in time to be tackled from the back by yet another predator beast. Its mate followed suit, biting at his helmet.

"They're pack hunters!" Hound exclaimed, rolling over and over in an attempt to dislodge the beasts. "Transform!"

"I'm trying! I'm trying, but they're on to me too tight!" Beachcomber exclaimed, shaking and kicking.

He managed to kick one beast of his leg. The predator-beast yipped and rolled over and over in the grass before getting to its feet and running away. Hound reared an elbow back and was rewarded with the sound of ribs breaking when it hit the side of the predator-beast on his shoulder. Howling in pain, the creature fled. It was only when it was gone did Hound realize how heavy and strong the predator-beasts were. No wonder why three were holding Beachcomber down.

"Hound, lend me a hand!" Beachcomber yelled. He hollered in pain when the predator on his arm suddenly detached itself and snapped down on the armor dangerously close to his neck.

Hound threw his last opponent off of his back and raced to Beachcomber. Before he got there, though, he heard a wild bleating and stopped short. From the woods behind him, a band of strong male herd herbivores stampeded, rushing to Beachcomber and the predators. Hound threw himself out of the way of the stampede's path, turning back to watch the flood of golden fur and sharp horns rush by with a thunder of hooves. Seeing themselves outnumbered and out-muscled, the predators released Beachcomber, yipping unhappily as they fled. In moment, the animals had all re-entered the forest amidst their chase, leaving the bloodied and banged-up Hound and Beachcomber alone in the meadow.

"Well," Hound panted, holding a hand out to Beachcomber, "_That_ was unexpected. I guess they're creatures with a social network, too."

"That's cool with me," Beachcomber squeaked, taking the hand and getting to his feet. "Think they saved us for distracting the predators?"

"I don't know," Hound replied, "I've never seen the organics at feeding time before."

_Red eyes bad, blue eyes good, blue eyes saved us,_ Hound thought, _this is too much to be a coincidence._

"Well, I think I know what _I'm_ going to do now," Hound announced.

"Aww, man, don't go killing all the ugly predator organics in the forest. It's not their fault if they're full of blood lust and hate!"

"No," Hound exclaimed, appaled at the idea of needless slaughter, "I'm going to join the Autobots!"

"Really, how'd you reckon that out?"

"Listen, you and me have been talking and thinking about what we're gonna do to avoid the war and Decepticons when it's obvious that they're gonna show up in even peaceful places like these. Now, we can scatter and let ourselves get picked off, or we can rally together and defeat the Decepticons. I mean, we got to at least _try_, right?"

"Say, you're on to something there!" Beachcomber agreed. "But, uh, can't we just all sit in a circle and pass the energon around while we talk it out?"

"The Decepticons won't sit and pass energon unless they get to keep all the energon and the talk is about surrender issues. It's either flight and eventual fight, or fight. So, what'd ya say, Beachcomber? Want to give this war a go and see if we can chase back the Decepticons?"

"Sure, man. But, eh, can we take your spaceship to the army? I kind of forgot where I parked mine…"

"Energon fried."

"It's not like that!"

**Author's Note****: To the fans of Beachcomber: **_**please**_** don't kill me for making Beachcomber a hippie figure, because he's one and you know it.**


	26. Preceptor

**Disclaimer: Transformers and all connected blessings belong to Hasbro. The story is for entertainment purposes only.**

**Chapter 26: Preceptor**

_ The bright lights from above glittered on his polished red, black, and grey armor. The students muttered eagerly, awaiting the ceremony for one of their favorite teachers. Even some of his rival scientists and teachers were there. He had fought through many a scoffing argument to prove that is far-out theories were just not over-blown scientific jargon, and he had won the fight. Now here he was, accepting the reward for it at last! His faceplate, still a bit soft and dull from Morphing-years, stretched into a happy, proud smile as he walked up on stage to accept yet another award in the science and mathematic fields._

_ But when he reached for the award and congratulating handshake, the lights went out and the audience disappeared. His reaching hands wrapped around not a doctrine award, but hologram data disks, and quickly pulled them down, tossing them haphazardly into a case. He was no longer a Morphing-yearling, but an adult, and a terrified one at that, too. An occasional flash of light poured through the windows and door-less home entrance, taking the place of artificial lighting whose power had long since been knocked out. A college intern darted into the small private quarters, yelling something incoherent among the banter of battle outside, but clearly begging him to hurry up. He heard a sharp cry from the intern and turned around in time to be caught up in the shadow of some monstrous machine--_

"Professor Preceptor, Professor Preceptor!"

Preceptor jerked awake, fully alert one moment, but then sank back down with a groan as pain swept through his body.

"Are you feeling pain? That's good; that can help us fix you up. Are you okay, Professor Preceptor?"

It was one of the college's medical students: Siliconia. She was one of the brightest medical students around. The purple and white femme was kneeling beside Preceptor on the ground. Around them, there were a handful of other students of the college Preceptor had worked at, all hiding in a city back alley. He was the oldest of them. He saw his suitcase lying beside him, thank Primus for that, but he could smell too much smoke and energon for his liking, and it was far too quiet for the city.

"M-My arm," Preceptor said, twitching his pained right arm. He was also aware of a crust of dried energon forming on his helmet; had he been hit on the head?

"Okay, that's a start. Hang in there, professor, and stay still! A Decepticon snuck up on you and we barely got you out of there before he ripped you apart. Big guy, a jet-former, colored dark blue and black, I recall. Looked almost like he was trying to hug ya at first, but he just wanted to crush your Spark, or drag you up into the sky and drop ya. Whew, I never knew I could run so fast!"

Siliconia continued to babble, as she was prone to do when she was working. She kept stumbling over her words, and her hands shook, but Preceptor let her stutter and shake. Their campus had just been over run by Decepticons, of _course_ she was going to stutter and shake.

Preceptor's arm had been snapped, and while Siliconia was able to re-connect some of the cables together, he would need professional medical attention to fully repair it. In the mean time, the damaged limb was bound up in a sling made out of a polishing clothe and wires they found lying around. His head wound was being kept from bleeding out anymore energon by the crust on it, so they didn't clean his helmet off.

"Excellent job, Siliconia," Preceptor commented, examining his arm, "You managed to successfully reconnect the anti-freeze equalizer with the stationary automaton and the primary electronic flow wires with the anti-motion electronics—"

"In Cybertronian, professor," Siliconia sighed.

"You did well," Preceptor stated. "So, what shall we do from here? Our base of operations and home is destroyed by the disastrous Decepticons and if I my visual sensors are not glitching, the city appears to be abandoned."

"We're gonna find the Autobots," one of the male students, freshman year, said.

"And where are they?"

"Beats me," the freshman said, shrugging, "We figured on wandering away from the Decepti-creeps until we find the Autobots."

"We'll have to get moving, then," one of the older students growled, "Before the Decepticons over take us."

"Core!" Siliconia exclaimed, "Professor Preceptor is injured and can't transform!"

"Then leave him behind," was the orange-black mech's rather cruel response, "We can't afford to let him slow us up!"

"Core!" the students exclaimed.

"Fine, fine," Core grumbled, "But if we're attacked, I'm not waiting for the old mech! Come on, let's go."

"I only happen to be seventy point eighty-six years older than you, young mech," Preceptor huffed.

Granted, 70.86 years may sound like a lot, but for Transformers, it was but a slice of time, similar to an Earthling's three years.

The seven-student and one-teacher group ventured from the alley they had been hiding in, coming out to a war-ravaged street. Preceptor noted that there were no bodies and privately thanked Primus. He carried his suitcase in his one good hand and the student group walked along in a tight, terrified huddle with Core, the largest and strongest of them, leading the way. Core, as Preceptor recalled, was a sports-major and was simply drifting through college with his sights on becoming a major sports player. Ah, who was Preceptor to complain if a mech was wasting his intellect by getting his head bashed into the floor by rough sports? He was, after all, one of the smartest mechs on Cybertron; it would be natural for him to be biased against brawn.

As the day wore on, they continued to wander through the city in search of protection and other survivors. Whenever they heard a sound, or thought they heard it, they would scramble for a hiding place. If they saw someone else moving a distance off, the other person would flee, as if wanting to protect whatever supplies they had looted. Preceptor, not being of a sports-y type mech, and injured, had to take several rests. It was on one of these rests that they stopped at a transport bus stop. An actual hover bus was on its side in the street intersection just to their right.

"For the love of Primus!" Core exclaimed, throwing his hands in the air. In one hand he gripped a bar he had pulled from the debris of a ruined building, making it his defense weapon. "That's it, we're leaving him behind!"

"Core," Siliconia snapped as Core began to move on, "We can't just leave him behind!"

"Watch me," Core called over his shoulders.

"Children, hush," Preceptor cautioned, "The Decepticons—"

"He's slowing us down! That's the _fifth _rest this hour!"

"You're counting?"

"My point is that if we want to live, we should leave the worthless lens unit behind."

"I happen to be able to turn into a microscope!" Preceptor exclaimed.

"Core, he's injured and he lost a lot of energon."

"It's just an arm!"

"And his _processing unit_! He could be suffering a concussion and broken logic chips!"

"Guys, shut up!" one of the freshmen whispered.

"I'm ready, I'm ready," Preceptor said, standing, "Let's silence our vocal units and move on, quickly!"

"It's the survival of the fittest now, Siliconia," Core snapped, "Watch out for yourself or you're going to get held back and killed!"

"Children," Preceptor hissed, "_Shut up!_"

Laser shots suddenly rang out, striking the over-turned bus and causing molten blobs of metal flying through the air. The students didn't even shout in fear; they simply transformed and scattered, every one of them. Preceptor, injured and alone, spun around, clenching his suitcase in his good hand as he looked for the source of the shot. Laser fire bit at the concrete in front of him, making him jump back and fall hard on his back end. He scrambled back and got to his feet even as he heard clomping metal boots approach him from up the smoke-strewn street. Preceptor saw a shape coming from the smoke and spun around, ready to run down another street. But he came face-to-chest with a Decepticon-insignia branded Transformer, instead.

Turning around and around, Preceptor realized, with a sinking feeling in his energon processing chamber, that he was surrounded and alone. Injured, weak, alone, no military training, and carrying a suitcase of his published scientific works and some private controversial ones, it looked like a hopeless formula of doom to the professor.

"Well, will you look at that?" one of the mech snickered, "Looks like our target came to us instead of us coming to him, boys!"

"Yeah, I recognize him now," another said, "Professor Preceptor, one of Cybertron's best master minds. He made the improved transforming sequence, right?"

"Yeah, and he also revolutionized the design of Cassetticon handlers."

"Don't look so scared, Preceptor," one of the mechs snickered, approaching. "Our boss just wants to have a little _chat_ with ya."

- - - -

_Not Megatron, not Megatron, not Megatron, not Megatron, not Megatron, not Megatron_, Preceptor prayed. _Please, let it be anyone by Megatron, anyone but Megatron, please, let it be anyone but Megatron!_

Preceptor had been locked in the back of an abandoned cargo hauler trailer, left behind in a traffic jam where the vehicles' drivers and passengers had long since abandoned them. Outside, Decepticons were looting from the vehicles and generally hanging out; sitting on the vehicles and drinking energon, swapping loot, and bragging out tall tales of battle. A couple of mechs guarded the trailer's one and only door, but the doors were locked to Preceptor. Preceptor's only company in the trailer was a sort of tiny, buggy-like vehicle parked in the corner and a strange contraption in the center of the floor. Preceptor believed it to be a gun of some sort, but the ammo had been removed from it.

Now, he could only clutch his case to his chest with his good arm and beg Primus for him not to meet Megatron. He just couldn't handle that sort of shock and after all, he had just been thrust into war yesterday! He had also learned to be terrified of the war lord after hearing of his feats of villainy.

The doors opened, briefly pouring light into the trailer. His optics were blinded by the light, and as sudden as it was there, someone entered and the doors shut again, leaving him in the dark with a single electric lantern on the floor to see by. His silver optics strained against the darkness, but when they finally adjusted, his terror turned to surprise.

_"Shockwave_??" he exclaimed, setting his suitcase on a box beside the gun contraption.

"You sound surprised to see me, Preceptor," the lavender mech replied.

"I haven't seen you sense the day before you killed Headmaster Peppermetal! Blasted, what happened to your arm?"

"I upgraded it," Shockwave replied, "And you know about Peppermetal?"

"Who doesn't? Everyone knew how much you hated the Headmaster for always rejecting your experiments. The other teachers were actually betting on when you would strike back, but I never partook in such embarrassing betting. We shared several students, you know. It was such a tragedy that we lost such a good upgrades teacher like you. But I'm getting off track: Are you apart of the Decepticons now? Your optic is still yellow, and the communication systems the Autobots and Decepticons use change one's optic color to blue or red, depending on what style of the system and faction one is using."

"I _do_ have the Decepticon communication link uploaded, as I _am_ apart of them, now, but I was able to by pass that annoying little fashion statement. But I am not here to socialize, but do business."

"Of course you are," Preceptor sighed. "You never _were_ one for social events. Primus, the New Years Part of '67 said _that_ much…"

"I know that you are as smart, or more so, than I am, Preceptor," Shockwave said. "_Everyone_ knows that. For the sake of old comrades helping each other out, I am personally inviting you to join the Decepticons. We could use your intellect, Preceptor. Primus knows how we have enough _fools_ running things, like that annoying, pompous _Starscream_…"

Preceptor thought he heard a note of bitterness with the last sentence.

"Shockwave," he said, "I am flattered that you are doing this for me, considering that we were only mild acquaintances, but…"

"But what?" Shockwave asked.

"I… I can't do it," Preceptor said quietly. "I love science and everything one can do with it, but I do not wish to use it for war or the enslavement of the universe. I am sorry, but I can not agree to your proposition."

"I see," Shockwave said coolly, "Then at least give me your suitcase. I at least know you enough to know that the only thing you would grab in an emergency is your precious data disks, including _unpublished works_. Allow me to have your suitcase and all its contents and I will personally escort you to the Autobot border and leave you to your own devices."

"No!" Preceptor exclaimed, placing a protective hand on the case, "There are blue prints and formulae for revolutionary weaponry in this case! Handing them over to you would be the equivalent of joining the Decepticons!"

"I present your options to you one last time, Preceptor," Shockwave growled, "Option one: Join the Decepticons and apply your genius processor to our cause. Option two: Should option one be denied, hand your suitcase and its contents over to me and I will personally ensure your safe passage to the Autobot territory. Option three: Should options one _and_ two be denied…" He pointed his gun-hand at Preceptor. "I kill you."

Preceptor swallowed hard, feeling his cooling systems jittering nervously and heating him up in fear. In spite of this, he forced himself to answer.

"Option three," he stated. "But before you kill me," he added hastily, "Tell me this: Why? Why join the Decepticons?"

"Because, Preceptor, old friend," Shockwave sighed, "Megatron has the strength, the gall, and genius to rule the Transformer race, to expand it into the farthest reaches of space and become the superior race over all beings, as it should be. I got _tired_ of teaching energon-drunken Morphing-yearlings, Preceptor, and I desired a more, shall we say, _worthy_ pursuit in which to dedicate my life.

"I have answered your question, foolish Preceptor, and now I bid you good bye."

Shockwave shot at Preceptor. Preceptor cried out and threw himself to the side, accidentally knocking over his suitcase in the process. Case and scientist hit the floor, with the case falling open and scattering data disks everywhere. Shockwave shot at Preceptor and he rolled to the side, leaving the laser shot to fry the floor.

"Autobots," someone suddenly bellowed, "Attack!"

"Autobots??" Shockwave exclaimed, looking around.

The trailer ceiling and walls fell open at that moment, letting sun light pour on them. The buggy in the corner activated, rolling over to the gun contraption. With long, spindly arms it collected up data disks as it rolled and pressed a button on the gun contraption. The gun swung up and around, shooting at the Decepticons. Shockwave hit the floor to avoid the spray of rapid laser fire. All around, supposedly non-sentient, abandoned vehicles transformed into Autobots and fought the Decepticons, knocking them off of their backs if they were thus burdened.

Caught off guard by the surprise attack, the Decepticons quickly fled. Shockwave looked at Preceptor one last time before flying off after his mechs. The triumphant Autobots cheered and a black and white police mech came up onto the raised trailer floor and shook Preceptor's good hand.

"Professor Preceptor, I'm Prowl, leader of the Third Division of the Autobot Army," the mech said, "We were sent her e to rescue you when we received news of your campus being attacked and your disappearance. Sorry we stalled, but we wanted to make sure that you were a friend and not foe."

See? It pays to be the biggest know-it-all on the planet when you're sent an entire division to rescue you.

"T-Thank you," Preceptor stuttered, "Better late than never, right? By the way, who is the operator of these machines? They are quite skilled."

He gestured to the gun on the trailer floor and the buggy, which was currently collecting up Preceptor's data disks.

"An inventor called Wheeljack created them, but their operator is Optimus over there; the big red and blue guy."

"Oh, my, what a specimen. What planet breeds such mechs?"

"Not quite sure, but rumor has it that he maimed Megatron himself before joining the Autobots. Who ever he is truly, he is proving to be a loyal Autobot and a grand fighter. Stay here, I'm going to go get Ratchet, our medic, to fix that arm of yours…"

The buggy rolled over to Preceptor and held up a stack of neatly ordered data disks as Prowl went off. Preceptor took them in hand, thanking the buggy, and carefully counted the pads. His tired look of relief turned to fearful confusion in a split second.

"Wait a minute," he whispered, "I'm missing a file!"

- - - -

Meanwhile, Shockwave was flying with his Decepticons to their main base. As he flew, he reached into a compartment in his chest and pulled out a data disk. On the flat block of black plastic, along the white space reserved for titling, was Preceptor's scrawled handwriting.

The title of the disk was: _Robo-Smasher. _


End file.
